The first post-election meeting of the TUSC all-Britain steering committee took place on Wednesday May 13th and, as has been our practice every year since 2011, agreed to publish a full report as a public record of the results of all the 750 or so TUSC, independent and other left candidates – advertised on the TUSC website prior to polling day (see here) – who stood on an anti-austerity and anti-war platform on May 7th.

The election report this year is very much a statistical digest, presenting in detail the results achieved by those standing outside of the ‘big five’ mainstream parties of Labour, Conservative, Reform, Liberal Democrat and the Greens (and the SNP and Plaid Cymru in Scotland and Wales) who could properly be described as anti-austerity and anti-war candidates.

This is not because there are no broader questions to analyse from what were, undoubtedly, seminal elections – far from it! What is the significance of the gains for Reform and the Greens, the Plaid Cymru surge in Wales and the election of the biggest-ever bloc of pro-independence MSPs to Holyrood, and, above all, the crushing defeat for Keir Starmer’s Tory-retread ‘Labour government’ – all are vital issues for socialists and the workers’ movement to assess as the task of rebuilding working class political representation is debated.

But this year was the biggest ‘outside the mainstream’ election challenge – the biggest ‘data dump’ of results that we have had to process – since over 800 candidates contested the local and general elections on the same day in 2015 (polling then a combined total of 163,517 votes). So gathering that information together was the first job to be done.

Facts to inform debate

Raw statistics, of course, still leave much to be discussed. In the run up to the elections, for example, TUSC argued that the danger of a fragmented election campaign by a mix of independents and different registered parties – there are 25 separate parties registered with the Electoral Commission included in this report – was that any local highlights achieved would not be properly recognised nationally.

“Think, for example, what the narrative will be from the elections on May 8th”, we wrote in February in an appeal to Your Party supporters, if even the best results won “are buried in the ‘others’ column?” While Reform, and the Greens positioning as the ‘progressive alternative’ to Starmer’s Labour, “are portrayed as the gainers”. And isn’t what has happened since polling day precisely the ‘burying’ of the best results?

The Greens increased their tally of councillors by 441 on May 7th, with national fanfare. But how widely is it known that the total vote secured by all the candidates listed in this report reached 441,314 and that over a hundred (102) of the candidates were elected? 

There is much more information to be gathered and assessed. There are, undoubtedly, many other issues to discuss from the May polls. But the report makes a start.

And factually grounding the debates about what needs to be done next is a vital first step. ■

Some summary points from the results include:

● The total vote for all the left independent candidates and those from TUSC, local community parties registered with the Electoral Commission, and other left-wing organisations on May 7th was 441,314.

● One hundred and one councillors were elected from the candidates listed here, representing nine different registered parties – 32 Aspire councillors in Tower Hamlets along with the directly-elected mayor; 24 Newham Independent Party councillors; nine Redbridge Independents; nine for the Your Bradford Independents party; five Lydiate and Maghull Independents on Sefton council; five Workers Party councillors (in Birmingham, Bury, Calderdale, and two in Rochdale); three for the Kingston Independent Residents Group, and one each from the Camden People’s Alliance and the Harrow Arise parties. And twelve with a straight ‘Independent’ description.

● The anger with Labour of workers and others from a Muslim background remains unabated. All bar ten of the 101 candidates listed here that were elected – the exceptions being Bingley on the outskirts of Bradford, the Lydiate and Maghull independents in Sefton, Hastings, and the Kingston councillors – represent wards with a Muslim population of 20% or more.

● Thirty-six of the candidates elected were sitting councillors, with an established reputation in their area. But still, of the candidates listed in this report, 18 were sitting councillors who lost their seats to Reform (in Coventry, Dudley, Hastings, Wakefield, Walsall, and West Lancashire) or because of surging support for the Greens (in Bradford, Hackney, Hastings and Islington) as national trends overrode the impact of the work they had done in the local community.

● The best results for candidates appearing with a TUSC description on the ballot paper were in Southampton’s Bevois ward, with Nadia Ditta’s 739 votes (23.8%) securing second place, and a 19.4% vote for third place in Knowsley’s Northwood ward.

● The best results for candidates appearing with the Your Party name on the ballot paper were in Birmingham council’s Small Heath ward, in second place behind the Liberal Democrats with a 24.1% share, and in West Lancashire, with the sitting councillor Ron Cooper securing a third place finish with 17.9%.