BRADSHAW’S DELIGHT AS LABOUR HOLD EXETER

LABOUR were able to mount a modest celebration in Exeter, holding onto control of the city council and their Devon County Council seats in a generally disastrous set of results for the party.

Long-serving Exeter Labour MP Ben Bradshaw, no friend of Jeremy Corbyn and his dramatic swing to the left, made no comment on his successor as leader, Sir Keir Starmer, as yesterday’s problems for the party unfolded.

Mr Bradshaw tweeted: “The first @ExeterCouncil results are in.

Fantastic for @Exeterlabour , with a huge increases in our majorities for first time candidates @ziontree - a political refugee from the Green Party - in Pennsylvania and Martin Pearce in Duryard St James. Congratulations both!”

A third of Exeter City Council was up for re-election in the delayed local elections, postponed in 2020 because of the pandemic.

Labour secured the four seats from the 14 up for grabs that they needed to retain the control of the council, but they saw their majority rise by one, as they picked up 11 of the 14 seats, with the Conservatives holding two, and the Green Party winning a seat.

The elected councillors will serve a three-year term to ensure the return to the usual electoral cycle, with the runner-up in Mincinglake and Whipton, where two councillors were elected with a by-election also taking place following the death of a serving councillor, serving just the one year. The Green Party picked up St David’s with Amy Sparling claiming a vacant seat, previously held by a Labour councillor.