Election 2022: Green surge costs Labour Hastings majority
The council's now under no overall control - with its former leader among those tasting defeat
Labour has lost its majority at Hastings after a Green Party surge pushed the borough council into no overall control.
Going into the election Labour controlled 18 of 32 council seats, with Conservatives holding 12 and the Green Party holding the remaining two.
But after the votes were tallied on Friday (May 6), Labour had 15, Conservatives 12 and the Greens five.
Three seats changed hands: Central St Leonards, Gensing and Tressell. All three went from Labour to Green.
The Greens also came close to taking Castle ward, falling just five votes short of unseating long-serving Labour councillor Judy Rogers.
The results leave no party with overall control of the council, meaning some form of coalition arrangement is likely to take hold in the coming weeks.
Speaking to LDRS after the final results came in, Green Party group leader Julia Hilton said: “We are not going to rush into anything. We are going to take a bit of time and see how things are. Labour also need to do that digesting and move on from the campaign stage. There is a bit of negative feeling on both sides, I think you could say.
“We’ve got quite a long shopping list of things we would like to see changes in, regardless of who we would be working with, especially to do with more transparency, much more questioning of decision-making processes and ideally a return to a committee system.
“In a committee system all councillors have an opportunity to use their skills as opposed to the cabinet system where everything is decided by eight to ten people.
“I think that would be to the benefit of everybody in the town. You need proper questioning, constructive but challenging conversations. I think there have been a lot of mistakes over the past few years, because there hasn’t been that opportunity to have people from different parties saying ‘hold on, why are you doing that?’”
It was a more mixed day for the Conservatives. While the party maintained all four of its existing seats (all with incumbent councillors), it was unable to repeat the successes of the previous round of elections in 2021.
In 2021, the Conservatives took four seats from Labour while securing re-election in four others. Had it been an all-out election, it was the sort of showing which could have seen political control of the council change hands.
This time round, however, all four of those wards — Baird, Ore, Silverhill and St Helens — elected or re-elected Labour councillors (two were incumbents).
Even so, Conservative group leader Andy Patmore argued the results showed that the town had ‘rejected’ what Labour was offering.
Speaking after his re-election in the town’s Maze Hill ward, Cllr Patmore said: “We have gone from a town that two years ago was so one-sided towards Labour and now we have no overall control in Hastings. That is a remarkable result.
“If you look at the national picture, of course the Conservatives have done quite poorly nationally as everything has been going on. We have managed to maintain the status quo this time round, but Labour have lost this town.
“I think the reason they’ve lost this town is because they haven’t listened to the rest of us for the past three, four, five years. I think the town will be a better place for the much more collaborative experience it is going to have over the next two to four years, with three parties involved.”
Labour group leader Paul Barnett took a different view, however, arguing the final results came about because of ‘anti-Tory swings’.
He said: “I think we’ve got to really think hard about why people have said they want the Labour Party to represent them, not the Conservative Party in most of the wards of the town.
“We know all the reasons for that. It is not just about government sleaze and lies, it is about long term policies that are actually crippling people’s personal finances and their health.
“Alongside that we have what a different group of people have said in the town today. They have said they also want to see a much clearer focus on climate emergency and for a lot of people of Hastings, saving the planet is their top priority.
“We need an administration that respects both of those things and brings them together, so we are not saving the planet at the expense of the poorest people of the town. We are saving it with the poorest people of the town benefitting at the same time.”
When asked what comes next for the council, Cllr Barnett said it was too early to say.
He said: “But what I’ve said from day one when I became leader is that this town needs real clear partnership working. I am open to working with anyone, who wants to work to the benefit of the people of the town. That is not just political parties that is organisations across the town, the residents all those people who have the town’s best interests at heart.
“The thing that unites everybody today, whoever they voted for, is the pride in Hastings. I think we all share that, whatever our political allegiance.
“I want to lead an administration that actually puts that pride first and delivers for the people of Hastings.”
FINAL RESULTS
Ashdown
EDWARDS Michael, Conservative (Incumbent): 619
HARTLEY Jane, Labour: 350
NEEDHAM Andrea, Green: 110
PERRY Nick, Liberal Democrats: 166
CON HOLD
PRE ELECTION: CON + CON
2018: CON + CON
2021: CON
Baird
FISHER Hannah, Conservative: 473
HOPE Dan, Green: 92
JONES Emlyn, Liberal Democrats: 42
TURNER Mike, Labour (Incumbent): 656
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + CON
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: CON
Braybrooke
ANDREW Craig, Conservative: 307
CHESSELL Veronica, Liberal Democrats: 80
DAVIES Nicholas William, The British Communist Party: 22
O`CALLAGHAN Margi, Labour: 804
PHILLIPS, Sally Green: 322
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + LAB, no incumbent standing
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB
Castle
CLARKE Sue, Conservative: 232
HORN Becca, Green: 722
ROGERS Judy, Labour (Incumbent): 727
STOODLEY Jonathan, Liberal Democrats: 52
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + GREEN
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB
Notes: While elected as a Labour candidate in 2021 the ward’s other councillor Claire Carr has since joined the Green Party.
Central St Leonards
COLLINS Tony, Green: 745
COX Ruby, Labour (Incumbent): 711
MILTON Steve, Liberal Democrats: 50
SAMADI, Mus, Conservative: 204
GREEN GAIN, LAB LOSS
PRE ELECTION: LAB + LAB
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB
Conquest
CARLYLE Gabriel, Green Party: 100
HAKKO Kenan, Labour: 346
RANKIN John, Conservative (Incumbent): 623
WAKEFORD Robert, Liberal Democrats: 221
CON HOLD
PRE ELECTION: CON + CON
2018: CON + CON
2021: CON
Gensing
FORWARD Kim, Labour (Incumbent): 671
JOBSON Amanda, Green: 776
MEADEN Chris, Conservative: 205
STOODLEY Susan, Liberal Democrats: 61
GREEN GAIN, LAB LOSS
PRE ELECTION: LAB + LAB
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB
Hollington
BARNETT Paul, Labour (Incumbent): 581
LORD Tracey, Green: 93
MURPHY Stuart, Conservative: 279
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + LAB
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB
Maze Hill
GREENLAND Justin, Labour: 365
KEEN Terry, Liberal Democrats: 135
MCCRAY Beccy, Green: 268
PATMORE Andy, Conservative (Incumbent): 611
CON HOLD
PRE ELECTION: CON + CON
2018: CON + CON
2021: CON
Old Hastings
BACON James, Labour (Incumbent): 981
HOLLIS Kim, Conservative: 241
PACEY Benjamin, Green: 701
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + GREEN
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: GREEN
Ore
HOLLIS James, Conservative: 484
ROLFE Gary, Green: 219
WILLIS Simon, Labour: 544
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + CON, no incumbent standing
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: CON
Silverhill
CAREY-STUART Dave, Green: 184
DE-ROE Sophie, Conservative: 625
GRANT Lee Joseph, Liberal Democrats: 62
SINDEN Nigel Colin, Labour (Incumbent): 698
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + CON
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: CON
St Helens
BATSFORD Andy, Labour (Incumbent): 941
BRENNAN Lucy, Green: 130
LLOYD Bob, Liberal Democrats: 75
LOE Laurie, Conservative: 746
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + CON
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: CON
Tressell
CROWTER Liam, Labour: 325
HAFFENDEN Glenn, Green: 635
SILLEM Judith Ann, Conservative: 175
GREEN GAIN, LAB LOSS
PRE ELECTION: LAB + LAB, no incumbent standing
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB
West St Leonards
BEAVER Matthew, Conservative (Incumbent): 508
CLARK Sherry, Green: 268
MUNN Christopher, Labour: 150
RAYMENT Stewart, Liberal Democrats: 98
CON HOLD
PRE ELECTION: CON + CON
2018: CON + CON
2021: CON
Wishing Tree
CANNAN John, Labour: 681
FAWBERT Stephanie, Green: 130
STREETEN Roger, Conservative: 458
LAB HOLD
PRE ELECTION: LAB + LAB, no incumbent standing
2018: LAB + LAB
2021: LAB