Today's election results from Reform UK show a shift in the country's political balance

From the Labour point of view, there are several slightly reassuring factors to which to point. Yes, it’s a by-election, traditionally the type of ballot where a protest vote is registered. Yes, the previous incumbent hardly did Labour in the area a favour by chinning an opponent on CCTV after a few shandies. Yes, Labour have had a hideous hand given to them in their first year of power with budgetary black holes, Donald Trump and all sorts in the in-tray. And yes, Labour did only lose by six votes.

But none of those can disguise that losing a 14,000-majority is a disaster for an administration that should be starting to spread its wings about now. Because the counter arguments are that the protest votes tend to happen much later in electoral cycles than month 10, and most voters actually realise that dealing with Trump is like trying to play chess with a toddler (The best you can hope for is that he does chuck the board across the room, as you’re never going to actually get a proper game. And you have to tell him that he’s won, every time).

So no wonder Sir Keir Starmer sounded a bit like he was licking his wounds as he talked about having to take “tough decisions” - after Labour figures came out to criticise some of the government’s moves such as scrapping the winter fuel allowance.

Because it’s not just Runcorn, and Sarah Pochin beating Karen Shore by the tight margin. It was the mayoralties in Doncaster and North Tyneside, where Reform came a close second in what would normally be solidly Labour areas. It’s Staffordshire County Council going under Reform control.

Sir Keir told Sky News: “The reason that we took the tough but right decisions in the budget was because we inherited a broken economy. Maybe other prime ministers would have walked past that, pretended it wasn’t there … I took the choice to make sure our economy was stable.”

The Prime Minister went on: “Yes, they were tough decisions, they were the right decisions. Because of those decisions we are now seeing waiting lists coming down, something people desperately want. Because of that, pensioners are now £470 up as of last month. These are really important changes we’ve brought about, but yes, they’re political choices.”

Ros Jones was narrowly re-elected as mayor of Doncaster, beating the Reform candidate by just under 700 votes. Speaking to the BBC after her result, she said that Labour need to “be listening to the man, woman and businesses on the street”.

She said: “I wrote as soon as the winter fuel allowance was actually mooted, and I said it was wrong, and therefore I stepped in immediately and used our household support fund to ensure no-one in Doncaster went cold during the winter.”

The increase in national insurance was “hitting some of our smaller businesses” and the squeeze on the personal independence payment was leaving many people “worried”, Ms Jones said.

And a newly elected Labour MP has also said the by-election result should mean “Labour must change course” and that the “first 10 months” in Government “haven’t been good enough”.

Brian Leishman, who represents Alloa and Grangemouth, posted on X on Friday morning: “People voted for real change last July & an end to austerity. The first 10 months haven’t been good enough or what the people want & if we don’t improve people’s living standards then the next government will be an extreme right-wing one.”

Kim Johnson, who represents Liverpool Riverside for Labour joined in to describe the Runcorn result as “a warning we can’t ignore”.

However, while this is very much a bad day for Labour, and one they will not want to see replicated in the future, spare a thought, if you will, for Kemi Badenoch’s Conservatives. The local election counter shows Reform piling up seats, but it’s the Tories who are losing them, not so much Labour.

Ukip threatened to break to become an established political party, but floundered once it had achieved its aims of securing a Brexit. Reform has no such laser focus, and is just hoovering up - and fuelling - discontent. As I said earlier, there is a lot of protest vote energy about today’s results, but we could be at the beginnings of a genuine (in England) five-party political system (Plaid Cymru and the SNP’s position in Wales and Scotland noted). This will make things very interesting - and very different - in months to come. Nigel Farage’s political clout in numbers may - finally - be approaching his media clout.