While results from the UK council elections continue to come in, it has already become clear that the Conservative Party has been dealt a heavy defeat overall, as the Tories lost 386 seats while winning only 1320. With nine councils out of 200 still yet to report, the Tories have lost control of about 12 councils, securing the leadership in at least 35.
The Labour Party and Liberal Democrats, in turn, have reported the biggest gains. Labour secured 238 new seats and control of 9 new councils, while the Lib Dems will have around 186 new seats with at least 5 new councils. The Labour Party's most impressive wins were reported in London, while the Liberal Democrats mostly scored victories by taking councils from the Tories.
Leader of the Conservative Party, Prime Minister Boris Johnson, has already admitted that the local elections were "tough" for his party, but nonetheless described the results as mixed, trying to find a grain of positivity in the news about the Tories' massive loss of seats.
"We had a tough night in some parts of the country, but on the other hand, in other parts of the country you are still seeing Conservatives going forward and making quite remarkable gains in places that haven't voted Conservative for a long time, if ever", Johnson said.
The staggering Tory defeat comes as Johnson's party is facing the aftermath of the Partygate scandal, where prominent members of the prime minister's cabinet and Johnson himself were caught violating the very pandemic isolation rules they themselves devised in 2020. The prime minister, meanwhile, remains focused on the situation in Ukraine and the Russian special military operation there, as his cabinet is trying to cope with soaring inflation that threatens to reach double digits amid rising consumer and electricity prices.
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