Polls have opened across many cities in England for local elections, with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak predicting a “hard night” ahead for his Conservative Party.
More than 8,000 council seats are up for grabs across 230 local authorities, ranging from small rural areas to some of the largest towns and cities.
Polls are also taking place to choose mayors in Bedford, Leicester, Mansfield and Middlesbrough.
The local elections will be the first major electoral test for the Prime Minister since he entered Number 10 in late October. They are likely to be the final polls before the next general election.
Speaking on the eve of the elections to an Onward think tank event on Wednesday night, Mr Sunak reportedly said: “We should be prepared that tomorrow night is going to be hard for us.
“Good councillors will lose their seats because of all that has happened over the past year.”
Mr Sunak was quoted in The Daily Telegraph as saying: “I've only been Prime Minister for six months but I do believe we're making good progress. Just think about where we were then and where we are now.”
He said his government had worked to improve the economy and move away from the “box set drama” of what went before his premiership, in what appeared to be a reference to predecessors Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.
Mr Sunak took over after Ms Truss's fiscal measures alarmed financial markets and led to her downfall.
She had been in Downing Street only 44 days, having taken over from Mr Johnson, who had been ousted following the partygate scandal and complaints over his handling of assault allegations against former deputy chief whip Chris Pincher.
The Tories have set expectation levels low for the local elections. Party chairman Greg Hands has said the ruling party in Westminster could lose 1,000 council seats.
Elections are not taking place in all parts of England. There are no contests in London and Birmingham, or areas including Cornwall, North Yorkshire and Cumbria.
It is the first time new voter ID rules have applied to all of England ahead of the change coming into force for UK general elections from October.
It will be compulsory for those turning up to polling stations to present photo identification to prove who they are before they are handed a voting slip.
Critics of the move, instigated by Conservative ministers, argue it could deter young people and ethnic minorities from voting.
The Tories trailed heavily behind Keir Starmer's Labour in opinion polling leading up Thursday's vote.
Labour is riding high, according to an Opinium survey carried out online between April 26 and 28, which indicated they could secure 44 per cent of the vote share, versus the Tories' 26 per cent — a lead of 18 points.
The poll of polls tracker kept by political website Politico said that, as of Tuesday, Labour had a slightly narrower lead of 16 points.
Polling experts say vote share will provide a clue to who could win a general election widely expected to be held next year.
Prof Sir John Curtice, a political academic, said Labour winning by more than 10 per cent of the projected national vote share — a method of applying the local election outcome on a national basis, as if everyone had the chance to vote — could be a marker that Mr Starmer is on course for Downing Street.
Tony Blair had double-digit local election vote share victories in the lead-up to New Labour's landslide in 1997, as did David Cameron's Tories before it headed up the coalition government in 2010.
Mr Starmer, speaking to broadcasters on the eve of the polls opening, said his party had “a positive case to tell” and that he hoped to make electoral “progress”.
The opposition leader said voters could “set Britain on a path of growth, security and the promise of a better future”.
He added: “If you believe it's time to build a better Britain you can do something simple — grab your ID, get down to your polling station and vote Labour today.”
The results picture is complicated due to the Tories performing poorly in May 2019 when the same set of council seats were last up for election.
Both Labour and the Conservatives fared badly, claiming 28 per cent of the national vote each on that occasion, with then-Tory leader Theresa May — who was struggling to get her Brexit deal through Parliament — losing more than 1,300 council seats and majority political control of 44 councils.
It means the Tories head into Thursday's polls from a low baseline.
The Liberal Democrats did well as a result of voters turning away from the Tories and Labour in 2019, meaning even a strong showing for the party, which is currently polling around the 11 per cent mark, could fail to produce a bumper crop of extra council seats.
The party is hoping to make gains in liberal areas of the south of England that it calls the “blue wall”.
“Senior Conservative MPs are in for a big shock. The Liberal Democrats are now on the cusp of causing a major political upset," said Daisy Cooper, deputy leader of the Liberal Democratic.
Polling stations opened at 7am and will close at 10pm.
About a quarter of the votes are expected to be counted during the night, with the rest counted during the day on Friday.
