Labour's declining poll performance contrasts sharply with the Conservatives' situation under new leader Kemi Badenoch, who is approaching the May local elections with caution. Despite the warm spring weather, Badenoch's campaign launch projected a sense of impending electoral doom, as she highlighted the potential loss of nearly all contested councils. Her sober outlook reflects the vulnerabilities of the Conservatives, given their past successes and challenges from the Liberal Democrats and Reform UK, indicating a tough battle ahead despite their historical position as a principal party of opposition.
Mrs Badenoch launched the Conservatives' campaign in warm spring weather on Thursday. From her message, however, it sounded as if she is leading her party into an electoral blizzard.
Even so, this is a spectacularly downbeat piece of expectation management from an outfit that still thinks of itself as Britain's natural party of government.
It is also true that the Liberal Democrats, buoyed by successes in Tory seats last July, hope to repeat the trick in counties like Buckinghamshire, Cornwall and Wiltshire in May.
Nevertheless, the gloom of the launch spoke volumes about a party that is still, in spite of its catastrophic defeat last year, the principal party of opposition and the most probable alternative government.
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