By KUNA,
London : Millions of voters headed for the ballot box Thursday as British Prime Minister Gordon Brown faced the first major electoral test of his premiership, commentators said.
Labour is braced for a backlash which could cost them up to 200 council seats across England and Wales, amid anger at the abolition of the 10 pence tax rate and a poor run in opinion polls.
But a bigger blow would be the loss of the London mayoralty, should Ken Livingstone go down to his main opposition Conservative rival Boris Johnson, the commentators added.
Voters in the British capital are also having their say in London Assembly (local parliament here) elections while 159 councils around the country have a total of 4,102 seats up for grabs.
Brown and his wife Sarah cast their votes early this morning in Westminster, central London, just a few minutes’ walk from Downing Street.
Ministers have sought to quell anger over the 10 pence tax row this week by apologising for apparently failing to realise millions of low earners would lose out.
The Prime Minister acknowledged yesterday the Government got it wrong in his most contrite comments to date.
“I’ll be honest about it, we made two mistakes: we didn’t cover as well as we should have that group of low-paid workers and low-income people who don’t get the working tax credit, and we weren’t able to help the 60-64 year olds who don’t get pensioners’ tax allowance,” he told the House of Commons.
Brown insisted, however, that Chancellor of the Exchequer (Finance Secretary) Alistair Darling was dealing with the issue and that poorer people would benefit over all from last month’s Budget.
Today’s vote is seen as the first substantial verdict on Brown’s premiership, although there were by-elections immediately after he took over from Tony Blair, the commentators pointed out.
One recent poll showed Labour trailing the Conservatives by 18 p percentage points, although others have been less damning.
Labour will take comfort from any signs that they have avoided losses on such a scale.
On the other hand, Conservative leader David Cameron is hoping to demonstrate that he is making big enough strides to win an outright House of Commons majority at the next General Election.