Thursday’s local elections in England were supposed to be about bin collections and council tax, but Brexit hung heavily in the air | Chris J Ratcliffe/Getty Images Brexit haunts England’s local elections Labour fails to achieve a breakthrough and the Tories avoid disaster — the “as you were” election.

LONDON — Two years on, the EU referendum is still dominating British politics — and the country is no closer to consensus.

Thursday’s local elections in England were supposed to be about bin collections and council tax, but Brexit hung heavily in the air.

Labour did well in Remain-supporting big cities, mopping up Tory seats in Liverpool and Manchester and recording its best result in London since 1971.

But there is an undoubted sense of anticlimax for Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters Friday as much of the rest of the country that voted strongly for Brexit in 2016 swung to the Tories, albeit mildly.

Theresa May was helped in her task by the nationwide collapse in support for the United Kingdom Independence Party, whose General Secretary Paul Oakley likened the party’s fortunes to the “Black Death,” after it was nearly wiped out in local government.

The one major party vehemently opposed to Brexit, the Liberal Democrats, had a decent night, taking Richmond council in leafy southwest London and picking up seats across the country.

Overall, it was, however, a night when little changed. Polling guru professor John Curtice summed up the night, declaring: "This is clearly not an election at which either party has moved decisively ahead of the other.” Rather more cuttingly he said: "Not a great deal has happened."

Here are five takeaways from Britain’s “as you were” elections:

Labour needs Brexiteers

To win a general election, Jeremy Corbyn needs to win over good chunks of Brexit Britain.

According to the results declared overnight, he is moving further behind the Tories in England’s small towns and countryside outside of the big urban centers.

Take Swindon, a key bellwether town: Labour had hoped to run the Tories close, with Corbyn visiting personally several times. In the end the Tories held on. “We went toe to toe with Labour and stopped them in their tracks,” one Tory MP said.

Leading political scientist Matthew Goodwin summed up Labour’s quandary on Twitter: “Memo to Labour - Unless you've set your sights on a two-ish point swing and a very shaky coalition with the [Scottish National Party]/Lib Dems then you are going to need to have something to say to pro-Leave, socially conservative voters in non-London England.”

Local election guru professor Michael Thrasher agreed, declaring early Friday that it was “certainly not a good night” for Corbyn.

Tories need Remainers

If Labour is losing ground in Brexit Britain, the Tories are falling even further behind in England’s Remain bastions.

While it did not suffer the wipeout some had forecast in London, there is no getting away from the fact it was a bad night for the Tories in the capital, with the vote swinging to Labour by 2 percentage points.

In Liverpool and Manchester, Labour made ground as well.

The results pouring in overnight and this morning suggest Theresa May has taken the Tory vote to above 40 percent and locked it in.

It is symptomatic of a wider problem for Theresa May and her party — they may be able to stop Corbyn in his tracks, but there is no route to a House of Commons majority without breaking into Remain-land.

If the local election results were replicated in a general election — a very big if — there would be another hung parliament, only with the Lib Dems gaining some seats from Tories, according to Thrasher.

Lib Dem revival

Talking of which, the one party that can reasonably claim something resembling a renaissance overnight is the Liberal Democrats.

Despite continuing to trail badly in the polls, it scored some significant victories, winning back control of Richmond in London and a few more seats across England.

Former minister Ed Davey claimed the results are "a sign of things to come."

"People are desperate for a voice that isn't a right-wing Brexit Tory voice or a left-wing Corbynista," he said.

Pollster Curtice called the results "mildly encouraging" for the Lib Dems.

Watch out for Brexit backlash

The results pouring in overnight and this morning suggest Theresa May has taken the Tory vote to above 40 percent and locked it in. This is no mean feat.

However, it means the party is now reliant on former UKIP and Brexit supporters.

“The electorate that it now has is disproportionately a Leave electorate,” Curtice told the BBC overnight. “Seventy percent of the Conservative vote are people that voted Leave.”

Is UKIP dead? It certainly appears to be on life support.

Herein lies the Tory danger. If May is seen to fail on her promise to deliver Brexit, this vote could splinter — handing power to Corbyn without him even having to win back leave voters. “It seems to me that what the Conservative Party must be able to do in the coming weeks and months is to deliver on Brexit in a way that will satisfy the aspirations of Leave voters,” Curtice said.

In private, Tory MPs have been saying the same for weeks. “We have to decide, are we the party that delivers Brexit or the Brexit party,” one minister said.

A plague on UKIP

Is UKIP dead? It certainly appears to be on life support Friday after winning just three seats in the country and losing more than 100 by midday in a disastrous performance.

Just three years ago, the party finished third in vote share at the general election.

General Secretary Paul Oakley gave the result a unique spin. “Think of the Black Death in the Middle Ages,” he told the BBC. “It comes along and it causes disruption, and then it goes dormant. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do. Our time isn’t finished, because Brexit is being betrayed.”

Asked whether he thought the Black Death was a good comparison to make, he said: “Absolutely. What’s wrong with that?” The plague, he said, had “led to economic growth and the Renaissance.”