Reform SURGE in to the 2026 Local Elections! Have the Greens Peaked?! By-Election Roundup

Added: 2026-05-06

[00:00:00]The final by-election round-up before the big massive local elections 2026 obviously happening next Thursday, May the 7th. Live stream here on the channel on May the 7th and 8th, of course.

[00:00:11]Starting here on the the X channel the X account.

[00:00:14]A short little plug again for the X account. If you do use X, please do go over and follow ElectWatchUK. You can see there.

[00:00:20]I've been using a bit more in the last week. A number of you have come and followed as well. I think we've picked up over 100 followers in the last week.

[00:00:24]So, thank you for coming over and following on X. Here it is.

[00:00:30]Plugging the YouTube channel in the reverse. But, do remember to to tune in for those live streams next week, Thursday 10:00 p.m. when the polls close we'll be on and then again Friday 10:00 a.m. in the morning we'll be back on for and that'll be the bulk of it cuz most of the election results will come in during the Friday. So, make sure you are subscribed to the channel with the notification bell hit. And now we're going to have a look at the charts for this last and final by-election round-up before the main event next week.

[00:00:53]Here we go and here's the charts. You should be able to notice some differences. I did take your feedback on board as promised. Um I'm afraid to say, if you look to the right, the the swing meter is gone. So, can we get an RIP swing meter in the comments, please?

[00:01:07]It's not necessarily gone forever gone for good. It could make a comeback if enough of you are passionate enough about it. But, it was splitting opinion and I think on the basis I I agreed with the people who said it wasn't quite working. So, it may make a comeback.

[00:01:18]But, for now we've got the turnout there in in its place which is what we needed as most of you said. And you can see the parties are now list listed in accordance with how they did the elections. So, um some changes made to the overall layout there. Hope that you like them. Again, get in the comments with your feedback.

[00:01:33]So, Tenbury Ward, Malvern Hills sorry, Malvern Hills.

[00:01:37]Do apologize. I was corrected on that last last week as well. Malvern Hills over in Worcestershire.

[00:01:43]A big win for Reform. You can see here 45% of the votes gaining from the Conservative Party. And this is exactly what Reform needed from this week going into next week. Now, I know it's only one by-election.

[00:01:57]But, you know, if the Tories had managed to hold off hold them off here it would have it would have dampened the sort of momentum of of Reform going into into the elections this next week.

[00:02:08]And look, they've got a comfortable win here.

[00:02:10]On a good turnout as well, by the way.

[00:02:11]Look, 41% turnout is is quite impressive.

[00:02:14]And and Reform getting up to 45% of the vote. Tories then on 30. That's not actually down to much. We'll have a look at the vote share changes in a minute.

[00:02:22]Liberal Democrats and the Greens is an interesting one finishing in last place here.

[00:02:26]So, is there question marks over their momentum now going into next week?

[00:02:30]Obviously, last week I said I said in my prediction on X, by the way. I'm that I thought the Greens would get about 20% of the vote similar to what they did last time. I thought they would maybe increase slightly. But, I thought they might stay around 20%.

[00:02:41]But, they're they're actually down. So, yeah, interesting. So, Reform gaining off of the Conservative Party a majority there of almost 15 points over the Conservatives in second place as well.

[00:02:52]Um And bear in mind we'll look at the vote share change again in a minute.

[00:02:56]But, bear in mind there was no Malvern independent candidate standing this time cuz in the election 2023 the Malvern candidate won the larger share of the votes won the first seat the Tories won the second seat. So, there is no now no longer a Conservative representing this ward on Malvern Hills Council. So, let's go and have a look at those vote share changes then.

[00:03:16]There it is. Now, bear in mind the independent's not showing up here because I can I'll maybe try and change this. But, because they didn't stand in this election it's not showing the the vote share changes. So, Reform almost off the end of the scale there with 45% of the vote. Obviously, they didn't stand here last time. So, they came in and gained all of that vote share. The independent last time out the Malvern Hills independent scored 42% of the vote. So, they've taken pretty much all of that vote by the looks of it.

[00:03:43]And some of the Tory vote as well, perhaps.

[00:03:46]The Tories down seven points which isn't a disaster for them. That's kind of what we've been seeing from the Tories in the last few months between you know, anywhere around 10 points basically.

[00:03:57]Whether it's seven or maybe 13 the other side. That's been that's been roughly what the Tories have been doing in most of these elections, I'd say. And then there's been a couple of course where they've had a big drop down to over 20 points. But, that's been much rarer compared to Labour at least. Liberal Democrats did all right here as well. Didn't stand last time either. But, they came in and got 13% of the vote almost.

[00:04:18]Maybe they took some of that Conservative vote as well. Maybe they took a bit of independent vote also. The Greens are down eight points. This is the interesting thing. We haven't really seen the Greens in a going backwards for a few weeks.

[00:04:30]Look, I mean this is in all fairness it's not one of these urban constituencies or urban areas that the Greens are going to do very well in next week. Like London.

[00:04:42]This is a very rural area. But, the question was well, can they break through? You know, can they can they break the mold of being this just only appealing to this sort of urbanista and ethnic minority? Can they can they appeal to to others outside of that? And it appears appears perhaps not.

[00:04:58]Maybe in this case the Liberal Democrats took a good chunk of that Green vote.

[00:05:01]You know, I was saying last week, wasn't I, how maybe the Greens are going to be have a blind spot. I'm sorry, going to are the blind spot of the Liberal Democrats. Well, perhaps not. Perhaps I was wrong on that. We'll have to wait and see next week when we tune into that live stream we'll see it all happen live. But, look, a big big win for Reform. That that's a vote share change is huge for them.

[00:05:19]Big momentum boost for them going ahead into next week.

[00:05:23]It's going to be a massive election.

[00:05:24]Like I said on that X post that I tweeted that I showed you at the beginning of this video. It it is going to be an era-defining election next week, I think. I think actually maybe an era starting. I think this might be the the the focal points where an era changes. Maybe you could say that started last year, last May.

[00:05:42]But, but this is going to be a big one.

[00:05:45]The losses that the Labour Party are going to take are going to be extraordinary. I think the Conservative Party are also in dire straits. So, it's not being talked about quite as much. But, we'll wait we'll see. Perhaps they will hold up better than we think. But, um I think the English councils are going to lose all of those councils they're defending.

[00:06:04]And I think in Scotland and Wales it's not going to go well for them either. But, enough of that because we are going to do a preview video, a final preview video slash maybe prediction video if I want to stick my neck out there and say prediction. That's going to be up next week at some point. I think Tuesday's the plan.

[00:06:18]Tuesday for the for the prediction video and then obviously the live stream 10:00 p.m. on Thursday. We're going to stay up and I think a handful of results coming in overnight. There won't be too many.

[00:06:27]But, we'll just stay up. It'll be a nice get to know you. I'll interact with you live. It'll be fun.

[00:06:32]We'll do some polls and stuff. A bit of back and forth. And then the main event will be Friday 10:00 a.m. live stream.

[00:06:38]All the results coming in. We'll be reacting live to them.

[00:06:41]And actually I have a call for help that I'm going to put out now. Because I've got a number of graphics that I've I've with the help of artificial intelligence programmed to show up on the screen for our election.

[00:06:53]This not least among them, this one that's on the screen now.

[00:06:56]What I could really do with is some helpers who are people who wouldn't mind particularly on the Friday if you're able. Um to essentially input votes into a spreadsheet for me. So, all you'd have to do I'll talk more about this in the video on Tuesday as well. But, you would just have to put in the votes. You'd be watching the votes come in on the council websites. Put in the votes in each ward for each party. And that's all you'd have to do. That that goes in and then I can that data can then go somewhere else and then it goes into this these graphs here. It would be just very helpful if I could have a few people helping me out cuz there's a lot of councils in England to be looking at.

[00:07:30]So, English councils is what I'm looking at help with really.

[00:07:33]However many of you feel comfortable getting involved in doing that that would be greatly appreciated.

[00:07:38]Um If you don't mind getting involved doing that, then if you could drop me an email at [email protected].

[00:07:47]It's on the screen. So, if you just drop me an email there.

[00:07:51]If you don't mind getting involved maybe just tell me what council you'd like to council or councils you wouldn't mind putting data in for so I can keep a tally of sort of who where's coming and where isn't. And that'll be really really helpful. So, I left that to the end cuz I know my my real ones stay to the end of the videos.

[00:08:05]It's a short video today cuz I've got to get off to work this afternoon. So, I can't keep going on.

[00:08:09]We'll talk more about the the the data input helping on the next video as well.

[00:08:13]And I'll show you the spreadsheet and stuff. But, yeah, if just hearing this now you're interested in helping with that I'll be greatly appreciative. Drop me an email in that email address and we'll go from there.

[00:08:23]Thank you all for watching and I will see you on Tuesday for the final preview video for the local elections 2026.