Learning Lessons: Planning Ahead

This is the fifth part of our ‘Learning Lessons’ series, which provides a space for candidates across England, Scotland and Wales to share what they heard on the doorstep and where they believe Labour should go next

“Labour land? On this evidence, not for much longer…”

This line from the Times’ Patrick Maguire, written as he toured Sefton with Nigel Farage, captured the overriding sentiment going into the 2026  local elections. A Labour party weighed down by the perceived shortcomings of national government would lose to everyone, everywhere. Sefton, even Sefton, wouldn’t be spared.

We agreed with the underlying diagnosis – not a single Labour vote could be taken for granted – but were confident there was no predetermined outcome to this election.

We are in and of Sefton. And it was not that our friends and families had suddenly become very right wing or very left wing, suddenly recognising Farage or Polanski as their saviours. They had become disillusioned with a mainstream politics they felt was introspective, at times self-serving, and ultimately a purveyor of the status quo that was failing them.

That proved to be a liberating starting point. Where Reform, the Greens and local independents were gaining ground simply by holding a mirror up to people’s grievances, we saw a gap for actual ideas and solutions – grounded in a track record of local delivery – that addressed those grievances head on. So we wrote a plan. Our Sefton, Our Future, co-created with candidates, local leaders and residents, opened with a letter setting out our terms:

“We aren’t here to reflect anger and grievance and sow division. Others will do that better than we can. In today’s politics, we will lose in a battle of who shouts louder. But we are confident we will win in a battle for the future.”

We had a record to point to. Children’s services taken from ‘inadequate’ to ‘good’. Adult social care a strong ‘good’. A £20m regeneration of Bootle’s Strand under way. Sefton shortlisted as ‘Most Improved Council’ in national awards.

But the plan made a deliberate choice: “We’re delighted to be recognised. But we’re not here to collect prizes.” A track record earns you the right to be ambitious about what comes next, but simply going into an election shouting about your record doesn’t meet the moment. This is not the time to tell people they’ve never had it so good.

So the plan then turned to new commitments. A new reporting system to put power in residents’ hands to flag potholes and missed bins, and track them through to resolution; a pledge to become a Living Wage borough, extending the Real Living Wage requirement to contractors and suppliers; and a flagship national summit on young people not in employment, education or training, convened in Sefton. (Our share of Neets is among the lowest in the country, and the rest of the country should learn from what has worked here.)

There was disagreement on ideas but unity in delivery. Every Labour candidate signed up to it. So did Sefton’s MPs and the Liverpool city region mayor, Steve Rotheram. The message: we are facing outwards, to Sefton’s future, and we will work together to deliver this plan. A month out from polling day, it was launched in a packed room by the region’s and borough’s political leaders, providing a booster shot to candidates as they took to the doors.

The national lesson is not complicated. Labour is not losing because the country has made a seismic ideological shift. It is losing because too often our politics is meeting a pervasive sense of decline and the legitimate grievances of voters by turning inwards. Not many candidates could knock on doors in the run-up to 7 May and tell voters, confidently, that they had a plan. Not many could give voters something to vote for rather than merely something to vote against. We’re proud that Sefton was an exception.

That difference, plus the immense work of our candidates and volunteers, was one of the major reasons we retained control of the council in difficult circumstances. It is an important lesson for national government as it faces down the threats of Reform and the Greens.

To put it simply: face the future. Have a plan. Embrace ideas. Share what you’ve done in a way that doesn’t take people for granted. Give voters something to vote for.

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