Minister admits local election results ‘not good’ for Tories as Labour vows ‘best is yet to come’

Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer has admitted the local election results were “not good” for the Conservatives, but insists Rishi Sunak is “starting to deliver in a quiet way for the British people”.

Her party lost more than a thousand seats after voters went to the polls across England, seeing Labour take over as the largest party in local government for the first time in more than 20 years.

Politics live: Sophy Ridge on Sunday digests local election results after ‘hammering’ for Tories

The minister told Sky News’ Sophy Ridge on Sunday programme that people were “angry and frustrated” with the government, and were finding the rising cost of living “difficult”.

But she blamed the long period the Tories have had in government, the impact of the pandemic and the fallout of the Ukraine war for the poor electoral performance, rather than Mr Sunak and his policies.

“I totally recognise we’ve had a really difficult few years,” she said. “[But] I do think that the prime minister, who’s been in office for six months, is getting the country back on track and is delivering, and I think we’re starting to gain the trust of the British public.”

See full local election results here

Meanwhile, Labour’s Wes Streeting said his party were “confident but not complacent” after Thursday’s results, which saw them gain over 500 seats and control of another 22 councils.

The shadow health secretary told Sophy Ridge: “I think those results do point to enormous progress made under [Sir] Keir Starmer’s leadership.

“He’s changed the Labour Party – now he’s got a hearing to be able to change the country. But there’s more to do.”

Mr Streeting promised the party would be setting out more of its big “missions” in the coming weeks, including its plans to tackle issues in the NHS and education.