Thatcher’s Party Loses, Averts Rout in Local Elections

Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Party lost heavily in local elections Thursday, and the socialist Labor Party posted its best performance since she won power 11 years ago.

But the Conservatives, in deep trouble over the economy and the imposition of an unpopular new tax, averted the rout forecast in opinion polls, in which Thatcher trailed by nearly 20 points.

“Not a marvelous result, but certainly not the disaster that was being predicted,” said Environment Secretary Chris Patten, the Cabinet official in charge of the new “poll tax,” a property-tax substitute. “It’s the massacre that didn’t happen.”

The Labor Party was jubilant, however. It was the only party to make net gains and easily outstripped its target of 200 new seats.

With results declared from 180 of the 201 councils, Labor had gained 10 to control 89 councils. The Conservatives lost eight and were left with control of 36.

The third-running centrist Social and Liberal Democratic Party controlled three councils and lost three. No party had overall control in the rest.

About 5,000 seats were at stake.

“We’re delighted,” said Labor campaign manager Bryan Gould.

But he said the Tories’ not doing as badly as predicted would lessen pressure by some worried Conservatives to try to shed Thatcher as their leader.

For the first time since Thatcher won power in 1979, Laborites made significant gains in the Tory heartlands of the prosperous south.

Labor seized control from the Tories of the south England port of Portsmouth, and for the first time in nearly 20 years, Laborites won seats in nearby Torbay, previously Conservative territory.

The Tories also lost control of the key northern industrial city of Bradford.

But in London, Labor fared badly in what some analysts saw as a continuing legacy of ultra-left Labor councils that captured control of some of the 36 boroughs in the 1980s.

In a key result, the Conservatives held with a hugely increased majority London’s Wandsworth borough, a focus of national attention after it established the lowest poll tax in the nation. The tax helps fund local council spending.

A BBC computer prediction early today indicated a swing of 12% against the government.

The elections were the first comprehensive voter test since Thatcher won a third successive term in 1987.

Thatcher hoped the poll tax, imposed April 1, would turn voters against high-spending Labor-controlled local authorities.

Instead, most families are paying more and blaming the Thatcher government. The tax is also seen as unfair because everyone in a district pays the same, irrespective of income.

Under the old system of property taxes, only the 17 million homeowners paid. Now all 38 million adult Britons have to pay, with rebates for the 9.5 million poorest.