Britain’s local elections have shown that Labour’s electoral heartlands have fractured, with white working-class voters largely opting for Reform UK while many Muslim voters abandoned it for the pro-Palestinian Green Party and independent candidates.
Traditionally, four out of five Muslims vote Labour. But anger over Keir Starmer’s stance on Gaza, which critics viewed as too supportive of Israel during the conflict, has triggered a dramatic collapse in support, and polling suggests only around 30 per cent of Muslim voters would now back Labour.
The results have exposed the growing political fragmentation across England, with Labour squeezed from multiple directions as Reform has made gains among older and less educated voters, while the Greens and pro-Gaza independents have surged in urban areas with large Muslim populations.
Data from the local elections show the Green Party’s vote increased most sharply in English council wards with sizeable Muslim populations. Where Muslims make up more than 10 per cent of the population, Green support rose by as much as 14 percentage points.
Dr Rakib Ehsan, a senior fellow at the Policy Exchange think tank who specialises in British socio-political behaviour, said Labour was “haemorrhaging” British Muslim support from voters angry over Gaza.
“There’s been a real appetite to punish Labour by voting for a pro-Gaza independent candidate,” he told The National. “Three in five British Muslims in areas where we did polling said they would consider voting for a pro-Gaza independent candidate to prevent a Labour one from winning.”
The Israel-Gaza conflict had become a defining political issue for many British Muslims, eclipsing more traditional concerns such as the economy or crime.
“The importance of Gaza is very strongly felt across the Ummah, the global Islamic community,” he said. “In our polling, when asked which issues would determine how they would vote in a local election, British Muslims were more likely to select Israel-Gaza than the economy, health care, housing, education and crime.”
Trigger event
Dr Andrew Barclay, a lecturer in politics at the University of Sheffield, agreed that the Israel-Palestine issue was a “trigger” event for Muslim voters turning away from Labour.
Labour lost a “huge proportion” of Muslim voters “almost overnight” at the last general election. “Up until that point, they would have been among the most staunchly pro-Labour groups in British society,” he told The National.
Though it was difficult to quantify the extent to which it influenced the vote, the “speed of change” followed Mr Starmer’s initial support for Israel after October 7. “It’s difficult to imagine that wouldn’t somehow be tarnishing the brand,” he said.
It will be very challenging for Labour to win those voters back, he added, even though its policy on Israel has shifted while in government, and has included the recognition of Palestine. “There’s not a lot of reason to go back to Labour just now, even with a new leader,” he said.
Ties collapse
The results have highlighted mounting difficulties for Labour in areas where Muslim communities historically delivered reliable majorities through long-standing local political networks.
Dr Ehsan, the lead author of a newe Policy Exchange report, argued that Labour was now confronting the collapse of traditional community-based patronage systems that once helped deliver bloc votes.
“It is a relatively youthful and energetic phenomenon different to the politics of old – one where votes were essentially banked by engaging with traditional faith-based authority and so-called community figures,” he added.
Instead, a new generation of politically engaged Muslim activists, many of them young, professional and highly capable on social media, has emerged.
Gaza had also led to a “growing disassociation” among British Muslims of Labour being their natural party. He warned it will be very difficult for the party to win back those voters.
Splitting
The rise of pro-Gaza independents and Green candidates was also not concentrated in just one geographical region but across a range of urban areas, including Birmingham, Blackburn and the London boroughs.
There was a strong possibility, too, that the Muslim Vote campaign was engaging with the Greens “to maximise damage on Labour in Muslim-concentrated parts of the country”, said Dr Erhan.
Furthermore, in some wards the turn away from Labour could have benefitted Reform, as the left-wing vote is split, Dr Barclay said. Muslim voters driven by the Israel-Palestine issue were more likely to vote for independent candidates or the Greens.
“If the previous Labour vote is split, that allows Reform to come through. That's why you get these slightly counter-intuitive results,” he said.
The biggest losses of vote share since the 2022 local elections were in the Dalston (44 per cent) and Hackney Central (49 per cent) wards in the borough of Hackney, where the councils swung to the Green Party, according to analysis by The National. The Borough of Hackney also voted for its first Green mayor.
In the Birmingham wards of Bordesley Green and Small Heath, where there are large Muslim populations, the councils swung to independent candidates and to Reform, with Labour losing 42 per cent of its vote share.
