Being trounced by Labour is bad... but is barely beating Reform even worse? ... trends now

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It has been impossible for weeks to find a Tory who thought they would win the Blackpool South by-election.

The party's previous MP left under a cloud, and it only required a 5.5 per cent swing to turn the seat red.

But at 26 per cent, the scale of the swing to Labour will still have come as a huge blow to Rishi Sunak.

That reinforces the idea that Keir Starmer is on track for power – and will set MPs' nerves jangling.

However, perhaps what will alarm them most is the Reform performance.

Although the insurgents did not quite push the Tories into third, it was a close-run thing - a bare 117 votes.