What a difference a year makes ...

A LABOUR administration was always likely to be the outcome of Thursday’s local election.

The party only needed to win one more seat to have a majority and even before the Lib Dems national meltdown, that was likely.

What was not predicted was the scale of the victory.

To take six seats from the Lib Dems and to perform well in Culcheth, Lymm and Stockton Heath shows this was a remarkable night.

Labour now has a comfortable majority and will already be plotting further gains in next year’s locals, with a handful of Lib Dems and Tories in vulnerable seats.

The challenge for Terry O’Neill and his new team of executive board members will be to keep their pre-election promises with the same budget constraints the previous Lib Dem and Tory bosses had.

And 34 councillors is a lot to keep happy in a party which has a volatile recent history in the town.

For the Lib Dems, Ian Marks is right to speak of a tsunami.

Much of their meticulous targeting and winning seats of the past decade has been wiped out.

Perhaps their only comfort is that all 57 seats weren’t up for grabs. If they had been, they could have been wiped out and overtaken by the Conservatives as the second biggest party at the Town Hall.

Which brings us to the Tories.

It was a night of what might have been. Close in Appleton, Stockton Heath and Lymm, but the reality remains they started the night with six and a status quo remains.

The worry will be how to defend Warrington South at a General Election. Most of the missing Lib Dem voters seem to have gone to Labour, an equation that may not add up to a great result for David Mowat.

But a year is a long time in politics – after all, this time last year the Lib Dems brought a battle bus to town the night after Nick Clegg’s breakthrough night in the TV debate.