Reform UK, the party led by Nigel Farage, stormed to a landslide victory in the Durham County Council elections, held on Thursday 1 May.
In the Bishop Auckland Division, in a huge field of 16 candidates, Lyndsey Fox, John Kinvig and Tom Redmond claimed all three available seats for Reform UK.
It was a similar story in West Auckland Division, where Nick Brown and Stephen Gray claimed the two seats for Reform UK while long-standing Labour councillor and former cabinet member, Rob Yorke lost out.
Overall, in what was seen by many as a shock result, the party swept the boards, taking 65 of the available 98 seats at the newly restructured County Hall while the traditional establishment parties were almost completely wiped out.
Labour returned just four councillors, down from 53 at the previous election in 2021 and down from 94 councillors in the 126-seat council just twelve years ago.
The Conservative Party held on to just one seat, having won 24 seats four years ago.
The Liberal Democracts, meanwhile, went from 17 seats to 14, while the Green Party gained one to double their representation to two seats.
The remaining twelve seats were won by independents who had secured a combined total of 31 seats in 2021 in a chamber that was controlled for the past four years by a coalition of all parties to shut out Labour, who had secured the most seats but not enough to form a majority.
This time there will be no need for coalitions with Reform taking over two thirds of all seats.
Bishop Auckland's local community newspaper.
