DAVID GROSSMAN:            In the TV studios, even before 
the results were in, the frantic spinning began.  Each party claiming the 
night was theirs. Iain Duncan Smith - in his first big test as leader - 
determined to put on a good show.  

                        So do the Conservatives 
have a right to be happy with their performance?  In bold figures they 
appear to have done rather well. While overall, Labour lost three hundred 
and thirty nine seats, the Liberal Democrat total was up just forty four 
seats, the Conservatives performed best, gaining two hundred and thirty 
eight seats and control of a further nine councils.   And if we look at 
the national share of the vote, again the Conservatives at least came out 
just ahead, Labour are on thirty three per cent,  the Liberal Democrats 
on twenty seven per cent, but the Tories are in first place on thirty four 
per cent.

                        But the local elections 
didn't set the Tory leadership dancing in the streets here outside Central 
Office, and for a very good reason.   Despite winning some seats, the party 
failed to take control of some of their target councils, like Trafford 
and Wolverhampton and the Conservatives actually lost control of some heartland 
councils like Cheltenham, Eastbourne and Worthing. Indeed on some measures 
at least, Iain Duncan Smith has actually made little or no improvements 
on the party left to him by William Hague.

PETER KELLNER:                The real problem for the 
Conservatives is that for an opposition party to be challenging for power 
at the next election, they need in these interim elections to be getting 
well over forty per cent of the vote.  What did they get on Thursday, a 
projected share of thirty four per cent.   Two years ago, similar elections, 
William Hague as leader, the Conservatives scored thirty eight per cent 
and they still went on a year later, to be hammered in the General Election. 
The Conservatives are way, way short of where they need to be, at this 
stage in the Parliament, if they're really to be challengers for power 
at the next General Election.

GROSSMAN:                    So why aren't voters 
returning to the Conservatives in the kind of numbers the party will need 
to have a chance of winning the next General Election. Well, the BBC has 
commissioned some opinion polling to find out how people see Iain Duncan 
Smith and his party and for the Conservatives the results make  depressing 
reading.  If Tony Blair has set the Tories a political mountain to climb, 
it seems at the moment Iain Duncan Smith has barely got his boots on. 

                        When voters were asked 
which Party: Is in touch with the views of ordinary people? Only eleven 
per cent thought the Conservatives were. When asked which party has the 
right leadership team? Only fourteen per cent replied Conservative.   And 
on specific issues, the results were just as bad - for example only thirteen 
per cent of voters thought the Tories could be trusted to run the NHS?

KELLNER:                    It's quite clear from 
all the polling evidence that the Conservative Party is still out of it, 
as far as most voters are concerned. They don't think the Conservative 
Party is sensible, or credible, or in any way with better policies than 
Labour. It's got a huge image problem it has to overcome in the next three 
years before the next General Election.

GROSSMAN:                    Local elections over 
then for another year.  The night's results weren't a disaster for the 
Tories,  but did show the party has a huge amount of work still to do.