Hard work should pay. Unlock quality journalism that champions free enterprise. |  | Neil Johnston Senior News Reporter | When Sir Keir Starmer appeared on Radio 2 yesterday afternoon, he promised no more about-turns.
Only two hours later, the Prime Minister abandoned his controversial plans to cancel local elections following The Telegraph’s Campaign for Democracy.
Now, Labour is facing an electoral wipeout.
According to a “mega-poll” of 5,000 voters, the party could lose majorities in 10 councils, of which six are predicted to be lost completely to other parties.
| Burnley, Crawley, Pendle, West Lancashire and Norfolk were delaying elections but are not included here | Source: Telegraph analysis of Open Council Data UK figures and JL Partners polling | The decision creates a fresh headache for Starmer, who is already struggling to convince his own MPs that he is fit to lead.
Until yesterday afternoon, 30 local authorities would have postponed elections in May, effectively disenfranchising nearly four million voters.
However, communities did not stand for it and neither did The Telegraph. Thirty-two days ago, we launched our campaign, calling for elections to go ahead and for the scrapping of an obscure clause in the Local Government Act 2000, which allows polls to be delayed without a full vote in Parliament.
Councils were looking to hide behind changes to local government structure as an excuse to postpone democracy and avoid a hammering at the ballot box.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the list of councils trying to avoid a reckoning with the electorate read like a who’s who of local government incompetence.
Some of the most financially unstable councils in Britain were among the 30 attempting to postpone votes. The local authorities were riddled with more than £7.7bn of debt between them at the end of the most recent financial year.
The Telegraph visited villages, towns and cities across the country where residents of all political persuasions were joining a dignified backlash against the plans.
We published dozens of stories, putting local issues on the front page and uncovering the failings upon which local authorities would prefer not to be judged.
Read more about how the campaign unfolded here ➤
Plus, Labour now faces local election wipeout. This data proves it ➤ | | Nigel Farage Labour can no longer run scared from the millions of voters who will vote them out in May Continue reading ➤ Telegraph View A forced but welcome U-turn on cancelling elections Continue reading ➤ Patrick Kidd Farage beams as ‘gutless’ Starmer caves in again Continue reading ➤ | | To make sure you don’t miss our newsletters when they land in your inbox, click here. | | Crime and policing specialist Danny Shaw yesterday revealed the growing problem of “ghost” number plates. Unreadable by automatic number plate recognition cameras, the rise of this practice of distorting the digits presents a serious threat to road safety. This is essential reporting on how some people in Britain aren’t playing by the rules and are making life more dangerous and expensive for the rest of us.
It’s an example of the quality journalism we strive to deliver and today it’s for subscribers only. If you haven’t subscribed yet, please just click through and sign up to read and join the debate straight away. Continue reading ➤ | |  | | Convicted terrorist Shahid Butt plans to stand in his boyhood home of Sparkhill as an independent candidate | | A Birmingham ward drowning in rubbish is braced for an election like no other. In Sparkhill, residents are not only furious at the ongoing bin strikes, but now it seems that Shahid Butt, a man convicted of terrorism, plans to stand as an independent candidate. In a further bizarre twist, Sharon Osbourne has been floated as an unlikely challenger. For subscribers only ➤ | | | Shelley Klein has had therapy on and off throughout her adult life, but it is really in her 60s that she has found it most helpful. She argues that people of her generation and older should abandon their stiff-upper-lip attitude to life. Therapy helps people to live properly, she says. Take couples’ counselling: it is so easy to get stuck in bad habits in relationships for years, but talking to a professional can be a surprising, and enlightening, experience. Continue reading ➤ | | | | | General Gordon’s Last Stand (left), a painting by George William Joy, depicts an attack on the colonial-era hero in a palace that today lies in ruin | | A whitewashed palace on the banks of the Nile now stands blackened by fire and scarred by artillery bombardment. British general Charles George Gordon was slain at this war-ravaged ruin in the centre of Khartoum in 1885. In 2023, the first blood was spilled here in a brutal conflict that has claimed the lives of thousands. Now, with help from Britain, Sudan is aiming to rebuild the site where the histories of both nations are intertwined. Craig Simpson, the first Western journalist to be given access to the Old Republican Palace, reports. Continue reading ➤ | | | | | While writer Liz Hodgkinson battles leaking boilers, council tax and water bills, her ex-husband and former Telegraph reporter, Neville, lives a carefree existence in a stately home and pays nothing for the privilege. He swapped married life for the Brahma Kumaris spiritual community, waking at 4am in white robes and abstaining from onions, garlic and sex. While Neville’s life may seem idyllic to some, Hodgkinson reveals the regimented reality hidden behind his “serene” existence. Continue reading ➤ | | | If you can recall a time when the resounding answer to the question “should I pay off my child’s student loan?” was met with a resounding “no, they’ll barely notice it”, that’s because it wasn’t all that long ago. However, graduates are now accruing £482 per second only in interest on their loans, and the newest university leavers face decades of debt from frozen thresholds and an extended repayment period. It means more families face this critical question, and it no longer has such a straightforward answer. Continue reading ➤ Below are two more helpful articles for you this morning: - In this week’s “Questor” column, Russ Mould investigates where markets are heading after turning away from the United States. Here’s where you could move your money.
- Given that 35 per cent of make-up sales are projected to take place in supermarkets rather than at beauty retailers by 2030, brands have been busy upping their budget product game. Here are our picks that are just as good as expensive brands.
| | Robert Duvall as Lt Col Kilgore in Apocalypse Now |  | Robbie Collin Chief Film Critic | Some actors can stun you into fandom with a single performance, but one of my favourite things about Robert Duvall, who died yesterday aged 95, is the way he astounded us almost ambiently.
Throughout the 1960s, 70s and early 80s, Duvall cropped up in many of the finest films Hollywood was making, from The Godfather parts I and II and Apocalypse Now to The Conversation and Network, but only vanishingly rarely as a lead.
Sometimes he just appeared in a scene or two, and sometimes in a more substantial supporting part, but you steadily grew to realise these films’ excellence and his presence in them were not unrelated.
Like Tom Hagen, his quietly ruthless Corleone clan consigliere in The Godfather films, Duvall thrived on screen in whispery proximity to power – which makes a tour of his finest roles double as a showcase of his contemporaries’ greatest work too.
Continue reading ➤
Plus, read his obituary here ➤ | | A polar bear stands at the edge of the frozen sea in Wouter van Hofwegen’s submission to the Sony World Photography Awards 2026.
See the full shortlist here ➤ | The rise of aeon-length films Every weekday, Orlando Bird, our loyal reader correspondent, shares an off-piste topic that has brought out the best of your opinions and stories. Orlando writes...
Are films getting too long? It’s an increasingly common complaint. I rarely make it to the cinema these days, but the last thing I saw happened to be Oppenheimer. I enjoyed it, but don’t remember feeling, at the 90-minute mark, that what I really needed was another football match’s worth of Cillian Murphy looking haunted.
In a recent article, however, Alexander Larman felt moved to defend such directorial largesse. “The idea that the long, luxuriant film ... should be an endangered species is enough to frighten true cineastes,” he argued.
Nicholas Young wasn’t convinced: “Not many films stand up to being more than two hours long. So many provide false endings. The audience is content that the story has been told and that, cinematically, the film has been brought to a satisfactory conclusion. It then has to endure a further unnecessary 20 minutes or more, which diminishes the experience.
“In the days before most people had a television, going to the cinema was a whole evening’s entertainment: a good B-film (often presented by Edgar Lustgarten); a short Look at Life documentary; a newsreel, plus Pearl and Dean’s commercials; and a trailer showing the following week’s programme. This left little time for a main feature lasting more than 90 minutes. When the odd epic did appear, it was interrupted by a suitable intermission.
“The mass production of televisions brought an end to all this, and a cinema-goer would now feel cheated by just an hour and a half’s entertainment. Thus, over the years, feature films have grown longer and longer, and self-indulgent directors often turn what’s meant to be an enjoyable evening into a tedious chore.”
Robert Danny felt that one epic in particular did earn its keep: “In 1960 I was lucky enough to be taken to see William Wyler’s Ben-Hur at the Empire cinema in Leicester Square. When the intermission came – more than two hours into the movie – I rose from my seat to leave, as I assumed it was all over. I am glad that my companion persuaded me to stay, or I would have missed the legendary chariot race in the second half.” Which long films do you have time for? Send your responses here, and the best of the bunch will feature in a future edition of From the Editor PM, for which you can sign up here.
Please confirm in your reply that you are happy to be featured and that we have your permission to use your name. | | Find as many words as you can in today’s Panagram, including the nine-letter solution. Visit Telegraph Puzzles to play a range of head-scratching games, including PlusWord, Sorted, and Quick, Mini or Cryptic Crosswords.
Yesterday’s Panagram was ENVELOPED. Come back tomorrow for the solution to today’s puzzle. | | Thank you for reading. Have a fulfilling day and I hope to see you tomorrow. Chris Evans, Editor
P.S. I’d love to hear what you think of this newsletter. You can email me your feedback here. | |
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