David Cameron’s Tories took a small but important step on the road to Downing Street last week with their most convincing local election performance in more than a decade. But they did not quite reach the key 40% share of vote.

An exclusive Sunday Times analysis of voting both this year and at previous local elections in more than 1,900 wards across the country shows that the Conservatives had a national equivalent share of the vote of 39%.

Labour, contrary to initial readings, scraped in second on 26%, while Sir Menzies Campbell’s Liberal Democrats were on 25%.

The Tories last recorded such a level of local election support just after John Major’s 1992 general election victory and during the Falklands war in 1982.

If such figures were repeated at a general election they would have a small overall Commons majority. It is a big if, however, because as usual the local election results diverged sharply from national opinion polls, which put Labour and the Tories at roughly level pegging.

Many electors either do not vote in local contests or respond only to local issues. They may also use their votes to fire a warning shot across the government’s bows.

Cheeringly for Cameron, however, many electors reacted to the government’s recent problems by switching straight from Labour to the Tories rather than to the Lib Dems or minority parties.

At the 2005 general election Labour’s share was 6% down overall, but the Tories improved by less than 1%. Last Thursday, by contrast, there was a straight 6% Labour to Conservative swing compared with the 2002 local contests.

The Tories now control twice as many local councils as Labour. Outside London, however, their progress was patchy. Half of all the seats they gained were in the capital; in the rest of England they averaged scarcely one seat gain per council.

There are now no Tory councillors in either Oxford or Cambridge. They did make modest headway in the more affluent areas of some big northern and Midlands towns such as Bolton, Coventry and Wakefield, but not enough to be sure of winning sufficient parliamentary seats north of the River Trent to form a government.

William Hague did nearly as well in the 2000 local elections, winning 38% of the vote. A year later he was humiliated at the general election. In 2004, with controversy about the Iraq war at its height, Labour also plunged to 26% in the local elections, only to recover once again.

Last week’s results do, though, look a little more solid for the Tories. Labour is deeply unpopular and the Lib Dems, under their new leader, appear to have stalled. The Tories will now find it much easier to claim that they alone present an alternative government.

Next year sees elections for almost every council in England outside London. Much of it is territory where the Tories and Lib Dems have fought for the suburban and rural local vote. If Cameron can move his party above the magical 40%, Labour is likely to have a real fight on its hands to retain power in 2009 or 2010.

The success of the British National party needs to be seen in context. It did well in the few places it targeted, but it remains a long way from posing a threat nationwide. Where, as in London, electors can vote for up to three candidates, it is easy for minority groups to persuade disaffected voters to “lend” them a vote. Westminster presents a challenge of a different order.

The authors are directors of the Elections Centre, University of Plymouth

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