So their performance is becoming clear, they're currently 400 councillors down, looks like they'll end with a loss of about 450-ish.
Reports are that Street has narrowly lost the West Midlands mayoralty, that'd be a massive blow if Labour have won it. Andy Street is one of the few Tory politicians that's genuinely admired across the political divide.
Houchen managed to defend that massive lead, but not by much.
Khan won by a comfortable margin in the end.
There was a 26 point swing in the by election, third largest in post war history.
BY any measure, this was a bad performance by the Tories. It wasn't quite a wipeout but it wasn't far off it.
No doubt the Tories will be spinning this on the airwaves unchallenged over the next week and the Daily Mail will lob another front page dedicated to Angela Rayner's tax affairs
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