Pressure is on me, says new mayor
Jarvis seeks to solve devolution dispute
SOUTH YORKSHIRE’S first metro-mayor says the pressure will be on him to end the damaging devolution dispute between the county’s rival council leaders after he was voted in with a commanding majority.
On a day when his party performed below expectations in local elections around the country, Labour MP Dan Jarvis was chosen by voters for the newly created role of Sheffield City Region mayor.
The former Paratrooper secured 144,154 votes after secondpreference votes were counted, while Conservative candidate Ian Walker came second with 50,619 votes.
A lack of agreement among South Yorkshire’s four council leaders means Mr Jarvis will not have access to the £30m a year and extra powers promised as part of a devolution deal signed with George Osborne in 2015.
And the Barnsley MP, who hopes to eventually bring about a wider One Yorkshire devolution deal, said his “big challenge is working together with the four local authorities [to] reach a consensus”.
He said: “If we don’t have that agreement, we won’t be able to make the most of the opportunities devolution offers.
“There are money and powers available for us to start using here in South Yorkshire but only if we reach an agreement of how we’re going to do that. The clock is ticking, the pressure will be on me.”
Asked how he could start a conversation about a region-wide deal with the leaders of Sheffield and Rotherham, who are committed to the more limited South Yorkshire arrangement, Mr Jarvis said: “I have a huge amount of time and respect for both of those leaders – I think what they’ve said is not that unreasonable.
“They’ve wanted to get this deal agreed in the first place and then look very carefully detail of any subsequent deal.
“I think for them, they’ll have to make a judgment about what’s in the best interest of the areas that they represent and I think it’s for all of us who believe in a wider Yorkshire deal to articulate the benefits to them.”
Elsewhere around Yorkshire, Labour took hold of Kirklees council, which has been under no overall control, but otherwise saw a mixed night of results despite heightened expectations.
Dr Patrick England, a BBC elections expert and University of Sheffield researcher, told
The Yorkshire Post that there had been a 2.5 per cent swing to the Conservatives from Labour across the region.
“North East Lincolnshire was a Labour target before the election, and they will have been disappointed not to take control. Indeed, it was the Conservatives who made the most significant advances there.”
The Conservatives held on to “crown jewel” authorities in London including Wandsworth, Westminster and Kensington, as well as the key Labour targets of Barnet and Hillingdon, while picking up votes from Ukip across England.
But despite the ongoing row over anti-Semitism and the lack of eye-catching victories, there were signs of progress for Labour and analysis suggested the two main parties were neck-and-neck overall in terms of national vote share.
Two years after the Brexit referendum, Ukip suffered a bloodbath, with dozens of councillors culled and its own general secretary comparing the party to the Black Death.