Conservatives lose control of Buckinghamshire Council by one seat
The Conservatives have lost control of Buckinghamshire Council after Reform UK and the Lib Dems made gains at the local elections.Historically, Buckinghamshire has been a strong Conservative county but while it has a majority on the council of 48 seats it needed to secure one more to keep control. However, Conservative leader at the authority Martin Tett, has put a loss of seats down to the rise of Reform UK. Voting turnout for the county was 37%.
The unitary authority will now be made up of 48 Conservative councillors, 27 Liberal Democrats, 11 Independents, four Labour, three Reform UK councillors, two for Wycombe Independents and two councillors from the Green Party. The Conservatives have held control over the county council since 1973 and the new unitary authority since 2020.
Martin Tett, leader of the authority's Conservatives says in this election "great" council leaders and councils had been lost. "Here in Buckinghamshire we have bucked the trend a bit. We haven't been wiped out, we are pretty well neck-and-neck between the Conservatives and all of the other parties added together. "I think we really just need to spend a little bit of time over the next two days to decide what to do."The people of Buckinghamshire deserve a good council - well run with a good majority... we need time to assess what that might look like." He put the loss of seats down to Reform UK who he said had "cannibalised our vote seat after seat after seat".
Until the election, Reform UK had just one seat on the authority in councillor Paul Irwin. There are now three Reform UK councillors but before the election Mr Irwin spoke of his hopes for more. He had said: "I'd like to get the minimum of six to 10 councillors - we can make a real difference with that - anything else will be a bonus."
Election analysis: Reform UK has played its part
Buckinghamshire Council becomes the latest authority where the Conservatives have lost full control, and again Reform UK has played its part.The Tories - who have controlled both the unitary council and the previous county council for many years - ended up one short of the 49 seats required for a majority, after the Liberal Democrats picked up a councillor in the Missenden Ward, which in 2021 had been a safe Tory seat.Martin Tett, the Conservative group leader on the authority, will now have to work with his fellow councillors to find a smaller party to form a coalition with over the next couple of days.Tett attributed Reform UK's vote share in some seats as playing a part with his party's losses, although the party only picked up three seats in the county it perhaps stopped the Tories in several wards around the county.The Liberal Democrats have also increased its number of councillors on the authority and return to being the second largest party.The Green Party has also doubled its number of councillors, but Labour have dropped to four, with 11 Independents and two Wycombe Independents making up the council, which was reduced from 147 councillors to 97 by the Boundary Commission for England.
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