Election special: snap analysis
5/8/202636 min
It’s been a dreadful night for Labour as council seats across the country have turned from red to turquoise. The Conservatives have not fared much better with Reform UK the big winner so far. With results still coming in, host Lucy Fisher discusses the fracturing of the vote and the future for beleaguered Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer with the FT’s deputy political editor Jim Pickard, Northern England correspondent Jen Williams and political columnist Stephen Bush.
Have a question for the panel? We’re planning a question and answer episode on Monday May 11. Email your questions to politicalfix@ft.com
Follow Lucy on X: @LOS_Fisher, and Bluesky: @lucyfisher.ft.com; Jim @PickardJE and @pickardje.bsky.social; Stephen @stephenkb & @stephenkb.bsky.social and Jen: @JenWilliamsMEN and @jenwilliamsft.bsky.social
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Presented by Lucy Fisher. Produced by Clare Williamson. Manuela Saragosa is the executive producer. Original music and mix by Breen Turner. The broadcast engineers were Andrew Giorgiades and Petros Gioumpasis. Cheryl Brumley is the FT’s global head of Audio.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsLucy Fisher· Host0:01
[upbeat music] Hello. It's lunchtime on Friday. Results are still coming in, but Labour have taken a hammering, Reform are on the march, the Greens are up, and the Tories have suffered heavy council losses, but clinched several wins in London. I'm Lucy Fisher, and this is Political Fix from the Financial Times. Let's get straight to it with our panel. Jim Pickard, who's been up since 4:00 AM. Hi, Jim.
Jim Pickard· Panelist0:24
Lucy, how dare you? It was 3:00 AM.
Lucy Fisher· Host0:27
How dare I minimize your sacrifice of sleep. [laughs] Stephen Bush, who eclipses you, Jim. He's been up all night, haven't you, Stephen?
Stephen Bush· Panelist0:33
I have, yep, so I might start to sundown during the pod, uh- [laughs] ... halfway through.
Lucy Fisher· Host0:39
And down the line from Manchester, it's Jen Williams. Hi, Jen. Did you get much sleep?
Jen Williams· Panelist0:43
I worked through for midnight, and then I did try and get to sleep, then the doorbell rang after about an hour. So yeah, I don't know what that was, but it didn't make me very happy, and I'm not very awake.
Lucy Fisher· Host0:53
Okay. Well, you're all slightly showing me up. I feel a bit embarrassed 'cause I had 40 winks, and I woke up at 7:00 AM to check in on, on all the results, dash to the office, and get on it. So, uh, I wish I could pretend I'm as frazzled and over-caffeinated as I presume you guys are. As I mentioned, vote counts are happening as we speak, but there are some clear themes emerging. Jim, give us a snapshot of where we stand.
Jim Pickard· Panelist1:16
So the theme is pretty much what we've been anticipating for months, but seeing it crystallize in front of our eyes is obviously fascinating. Now, as of lunchtime on Friday, Reform is over 400 seats up, Conservatives around