In the coming days I will be setting out our path to break with the status quo once and for all by building a stronger and fairer UK

These were very tough election results. It hurts to lose brilliant local candidates and leaders – friends and colleagues who represent the best of the Labour party. I take responsibility for that and feel it very deeply. It is right we reflect and learn the right lessons.

While the results will understandably lead to much debate about what’s changed in British politics, that should not overshadow the fact that for years voters have been deeply frustrated with the status quo – constantly hoping that things will get better and that politics will deliver real change in their lives.

Keir Starmer is the UK prime minister

The theme of earth’s biggest art extravaganza – spiritual rest – felt wildly wrong for our crisis-hit planet. Thank goodness for the pavilions, from fake babies to hi-tech sperm banks to a chocolate Russell Crowe

It was almost over before it even started. This year’s Venice Biennale has been tearing itself apart for months: countries not showing up, artists getting fired, exhibitions being cancelled, funding getting pulled. There were petitions and protests months before a painting was on a wall. The jury quit in the days leading up to the opening, then Iran quit, then the European Commission quit. There were protests against Israel and Russia during the preview, artists went on strike and artworks were replaced with installations of Palestinian flags.

The whole thing was a massive mess of conflicting politics, personal tragedy and unresolvable ideological differences from the very beginning. And all this without even mentioning that the curator, Koyo Kouoh, died last year and wasn’t able to see her artistic vision through to completion. In a sense, the 2026 Venice Biennale never stood a chance.

Head coach Álvaro Arbeloa is facing the bitterest of ends as faint hopes are set to be extinguished by fiercest rivals

The vice-captain was taken to hospital for stitches having been laid out by his midfield partner. Another midfielder said he wouldn’t play any more; as if he was going to play anyway. The manager wasn’t asking for much, just that they didn’t swan out there as if wearing tuxedos, and that’s still asking too much. The centre-back hit the left-back. The winger fell out with the last coach. The captain fell out with this coach. And the superstar, already accused of not caring, swanning off to Sardinia, drives out of the training ground, past the cameras and away from the whole sorry mess, laughing his head off. Now here’s Barcelona.

You think things can’t get any worse but things can always get worse. The most painful week anyone could remember, maybe the biggest, most public crisis they have ever had, concludes with Real Madrid travelling to the Camp Nou on Sunday for the clásico. If they don’t win, and few believe they can given the football they play and the faultlines that run through their dressing room, they will watch Barcelona become champions with three games left, going down as the flames go higher and history is made. It would be the first time in 94 years a meeting of sport’s great rivals decides the title – only this title has long been decided, both cause and consequence of the turmoil Madrid are in.

Keir Starmer’s party lost out to Reform and the Greens, with no respite in Scotland, Wales or England. These maps show the scale of the historic results

• Election 2026 live: latest news updates

• Full results from England, Scotland and Wales

Labour has suffered heavy losses across England, Scotland and Wales, losing ground to opponents on the left and the right in a fragmented political system.

The graphics below show where Labour’s losses were most severe, and how the electoral landscape has changed as a result.

Local elections appear to signal end of two-party politics with five parties in the game in England

• Elections 2026 – live updates

• Full results from England, Scotland and Wales

It all panned out pretty much as everyone had expected. Nigel Farage was insufferably pleased with himself. Keir Starmer looked hunted while insisting he was going to remain prime minister for ever. Longer possibly. Kemi Badenoch grinned wildly, saying the Tories were back in the game as they slumped to insignificance everywhere but the south-east. Ed Davey became supreme leader of the People’s Republic of Richmond upon Thames where the Lib Dems won all 54 seats. Zack Polanski chose not to make an appearance before lunchtime. And Huw Irranca-Davies, Labour’s erstwhile deputy first minister in Wales, conceded defeat before a vote had been counted. Business as usual.

Except it wasn’t. These were the local elections that appeared to signal the end of two-party politics. There were now five parties in the game in England. That’s before we had got to Plaid Cymru in Wales and the SNP in Scotland. And by the end of the night, Labour and the Conservatives were lying in ruins. Their only consolation being that their losses weren’t even worse. If their election campaigns had taught them anything, it was how to manage expectations.

Adolescence writer Jack Thorne’s romantic new drama Falling is quite the gear shift. Its stars open up about what it’s like to research a love so controversial that the church couldn’t allow it

The scene is the convent garden of a closed order of nuns, the place is somewhere in the UK with a maelstrom of social problems – which, let’s be real, could be any of it. Keeley Hawes’s Anna, a nun, isn’t self-righteously cloistered; she makes regular forays into the real world to do good works at food banks. But she’s not of this world. She moves with such unobtrusive poise it takes a beat to work out what it reminds you of: obedience. Bride of Christ, remember? She wears her faith lightly: when she’s in the walled garden, it’s to grow cabbages not praise God’s creation, but she still radiates peace, and her vegetable patch radiates it right back at her.

In the 90s, Hawes slayed one period drama after another: Wives and Daughters, Our Mutual Friend. For Falling – the surprising project from writer-creator Jack Thorne, who made such a strong statement about the modern condition and its harsh edges with Adolescence that MPs were debating it in parliament – she channels something I haven’t seen since those days. Her range of gorgeous guileless expressions.

Welsh Labour leader and first minister Eluned Morgan loses seat with party pushed into third place behind Plaid Cymru and Reform

• 2026 election results: latest from local, Scottish and Welsh votes

• 2026 elections mapped: how Labour lost ground in different directions

We’re getting statements from some of the political parties now as we wait for results.

For the Conservatives, party chairman Kevin Hollinrake said:

We have run an energetic and positive campaign, showcasing that we have a clear plan to get Britain working again and that we have the team to deliver it... We know that so soon after a historic general election defeat and contesting wards won during the Party’s polling highs, that this will be a difficult set of elections for us. But we will continue to rebuild and to show the public that we have changed, to demonstrate that only this new Conservative party is a credible alternative.

People are deeply disappointed with a Labour government that has been too timid to fix the country, but they are also appalled by the rise of Reform and Nigel Farage’s Trump-style politics. While those on the extremes of the right and the left want to burn everything down, Liberal Democrats want to fix what’s broken. Every Liberal Democrat local champion elected today will fight tirelessly for the communities they serve.

I’ve travelled across England and Wales and I’m hearing the same everywhere I go – confidence that we will win more councillors than ever before. The news from the doorstep is that we will be taking seats from not just Labour but the Tories and Lib Dems too, from all across the country. Voters are responding to the fact that Greens are the only party taking the cost-of-living crisis seriously, with real plans to cut bills, reduce rents and provide genuinely affordable homes, as well as tackling the climate and nature crisis.

Throughout this election, we have heard a clear appetite for change. People want a government that will stand up for Wales and focus relentlessly on the key issues affecting their lives. People have told us they have been inspired by Rhun ap Iorwerth’s leadership and driven by a desire for a positive alternative to Reform UK’s chaos and division.

Senior Labour MPs urge prime minister to step down within year as party loses control of 25 English councils and humbled in Wales

• Election 2026 live: latest news updates

• Full results from England, Scotland and Wales

• Mapped: how Labour lost ground in different directions

Keir Starmer is under pressure to set out a timeline for his departure after a crushing defeat in elections across Britain prompted senior Labour MPs to call for him to step down within a year.

In a disastrous set of results, Labour had lost control of more than 25 councils and almost 1,000 council seats in England by Friday evening, many to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, which made large gains across the Midlands and the north as well as taking seats from the Tories in the south.

Farage said a “truly historic shift in British politics” had occurred after Reform UK won hundreds of seats and control of more councils in England. The gains included Essex where the Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch, has her constituency and which the Conservatives held for 25 years.

Plaid Cymru became the largest party in Wales, beating Reform into second place, after Labour admitted it was on course to lose control of the Senedd for the first time since devolution. Morgan, the first woman to lead the Welsh government, became the highest-profile casualty and called on Labour to “go back to being the party of the working class”.

The SNP leader, John Swinney, declared victory in the Holyrood elections – though was expected to fall short of an outright majority. The Scottish Labour leader, Anas Sarwar, conceded defeat saying his party had failed to counter “national dissatisfaction” with Starmer.

The Greens gained their first two directly elected mayors – in Hackney and Lewisham – although they missed out on some more ambitious targets in London, as their leader, Zack Polanski, declared Britain’s two-party politics “dead and buried”. They also won three councils: Norwich, Hastings and Waltham Forest.

The Tories were on course to lose hundreds of seats – both to Reform and the Liberal Democrats – across the south of England. However, they won back the flagship Westminster council in central London, with Badenoch announcing it meant the party was “coming back”.

Labour appeared to be struggling in its London stronghold, despite early indications that its vote was holding up, unexpectedly losing control of Brent. Party insiders were closely watching councils including Lambeth, Lewisham and Haringey.

Party has success in Labour and Tory heartland areas but one pollster says results suggest Reform may have peaked

• Elections 2026 – live updates

• Full results from England, Scotland and Wales

Nigel Farage hailed sweeping election wins for Reform UK as a “historic shift in British politics” on a day when the populist party made gains at the expense of Labour and the Conservatives.

Reform made advances in heartland areas of both parties, clocking up substantial early results in the English local elections by taking control of Essex county council, Havering – its first London local authority – and Sunderland city council.

Leader Rhun ap Iorwerth says he is ready to become first minister and form next Welsh government

• Election 2026 live: latest news updates

• Full results from England, Scotland and Wales

Plaid Cymru has won the Welsh Senedd elections, ending 100 years of Labour dominance in Wales and blocking the momentum of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.

The leader of the centre-left Welsh nationalist party, Rhun ap Iorwerth, said he stood ready to become first minister and form the next Welsh government, taking over from Welsh Labour, who have governed in Wales since devolution began in 1999.