World | UK
Brown faces key electoral test
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, his popularity plunging and his reputation for economic competence under fire, faced his first electoral test on Thursday since taking over from Tony Blair in June.
- Agencies
- Published: 00:30 May 2, 2008
London: British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, his popularity plunging and his reputation for economic competence under fire, faced his first electoral test on Thursday since taking over from Tony Blair in June.
Britons began voting in local elections across England and Wales, as well as in a close battle between two political mavericks for the powerful job of mayor of London.
The ruling Labour Party did badly at the last local elections in 2004, when public anger was running high over Britain's support for the United States in the Iraq war.
If Brown loses even more ground this time - and the capital falls to the opposition Conservative Party - it would further damage his standing and fan speculation over a possible challenge to his leadership.
"It becomes a story. Every small mistake adds up. It will be seen as part of this narrative that it is a government in disarray," said James North, 30, a computer programmer voting in north London.
Victory for Conservative candidate Boris Johnson in the race to be mayor of London would be a boost for party leader David Cameron, who will try to end a Labour run of three successive triumphs at the next national parliamentary election.
"I think it is going to be very close," London mayor Ken Livingstone told reporters as he cast his vote after strolling to his local polling station.
"Nothing is certain until tonight," Johnson said after arriving at his polling station by car with tight police security.
Governments traditionally suffer a bloody nose in mid-term polls and Brown does not have to call a parliamentary election until 2010, by which time he will be hoping the global credit crunch will have eased. Brown's standing soared after he took over from Blair after 10 years as finance minister overseeing steady economic growth.
But the media and opposition accused him of dithering over calling a snap election in October - a move he eventually decided against - and he has also been beset by party in-fighting, economic turmoil and industrial unrest.
On Wednesday, Brown acknowledged he had made mistakes over tax reform. A party revolt had forced him to make concessions to prevent people on low incomes being hurt by the changes. And a poll this week gave the Conservatives a huge 14-point lead.
About 4,000 seats on 160 councils across England and Wales are up for grabs in the local elections.
London mayor
'Run-offinevitable'
The race for London Mayor narrowed in the final poll of the campaign.
Boris Johnson's lead has almost halved to six points over Ken Livingstone as the capital goes to the ballot box. In the final YouGov poll for the Evening Standard, the Tory candidate was on 53 per cent to the Mayor's 47 in the almost inevitable run-off. The results suggest the contest will go to the wire as 11 per cent of voters said they had still not decided. Tory candidate was seven points ahead on first preference votes on 43 per cent to Livingstone's 36 per cent. This is down from 11 points - 46 per cent to 35 per cent - in the YouGov poll earlier this week.
Polling experts suggested the wider gap on Monday could be explained by Livingstone being hit by Labour's national troubles over the 10p tax rate.
- Evening Standard
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