The forgotten local elections

With everyone focusing their attention on the outcome of the general election, it seems the local elections have been somewhat if not totally overlooked.

There were a couple of results that caught my interest.

The first was for Brighton & Hove Council which until Thursday had been controlled by the Green Party. The Argus reports:

The Labour party have secured the most seats in Brighton and Hove, taking control of the city council from the Greens.

Labour took 23 of the city council's 54 seats with the Conservatives finishing in second place with 20 seats and the Green Party with a disappointing 11 councillors elected.

Given how badly the faction-ridden Green Party ran the council, even alienating the local unions the outcome is far from surprising.  The local Green MP Caroline Lucas managed to buck the trend and hang on to her seat.

A good result for Labour in Brighton but bad news for them in Thanet.

Although Nick Farage failed to win the seat, his party managed to gain control of Thanet Council. The first in the country that UKIP has won. The Daily Mirror reports:

UKIP is running its first ever council after a massive landslide in Nigel Farage's target seat.

The party has wiped out Labour on Thanet District Council, turning the authority purple in another heavy blow for Ed Miliband's party.

UKIP now has a massive 33 seats after winning 36% of the votes in the area, compared to 31% for the Tories and 24% for Labour.

Labour was knocked back to just 4 seats.

The local elections held in around one third of the seats resulted in a similar pattern to the general election. 

The Tories gained 497 seats whilst Labour lost 179. The Liberal Democrats lost a third of the seats they contested, some 365 in all.

UKIP managed to pick up 171 Council seats whilst the BNP lost it's only sitting Councillor.