Beaten Tories voting for absent Reform leader, clueless new councillors and angry swipe from Greens mark first WCC AGM

Proceedings were mostly civil at the Warwickshire County Council AGM on 16th May when newly elected councillors met in the hallowed council chamber of Shire Hall in Warwick.

It was the first meeting of the full council since the 1st May local elections which saw a change in hue from blue to cyan as Reform nabbed 22 seats against the Tories lowly nine.

The Farage-fuelled title wave obliterated the Tories previous tally of 42 seats, and saw Izzi Seccombe swivel down the plughole after a 12-year reign as leader.

Since then the Herald has been doing our best primary-school arithmetic to work out if the other parties could club together their apples to scupper Reform taking the leadership - as they only have 22 of the 57 seats and therefore don’t have enough apples for a majority rule. They did have 23 but one of their apples was eaten by councillor Luke Shingler who won as a Reform candidate but had to become an independent because of his job, which no-one - possibly not even Luke himself - seems to know the details of.

In theory a combination of other parties, including Lib Dems (14 apples/seats), Green Party (seven), Labour (three), could have united to rule the orchard. But the thirst for power proved irresistible for the Tories who largely chose to quietly support Reform in what you might call a playground swapsies deal that sees the Tories sweetened with a couple of top jobs - to be announced.

Council CEO Monica Fogarty, doyenne of correct procedure and who sits on the top table with the chair, was kept very busy as a lot of the many newcomers didn’t look to have a Scooby-Doo what was going on, with much rustling of papers, blank looks and elbow-nudging going on.

Although it must be said new chair Edward Harris (Reform, Baddesley & Dordon) seemed to have a bit of gravitas to him, and he promised to keep everything dignified and respectuful going forward.

The way the new chair and leaders are elected is done by roll call - Monica says your name and you must bellow forth your chosen nominee.

With the exception of Cllr Chirs Mills (Con, Kineton & Red Horse), who abstained, each of the Tory councillors seemed to offer their votes as though through gritted teeth as they backed Reform councillors Harris and Howard as chair and leader respectively. A palpable sense of shame seemed to pall over the once proud Blues as they uttered the names of their former rivals. It was sort of like when anyone in Harry Potter has to say Lord Voldemort’s name.

Speaking of he who wasn’t there - new leader Rob Howard was apparently on his holidays and couldn’t make the meeting.

To be fair it was a rather dull meeting with little political argy-bargy, so who wouldn’t rather be sipping a pina colada somewhere cheerier?

Howard’s absence did at least give Cllr Will Roberts (Green, Leamington Willes) a chance to take a small swipe during the leadership vote. He worried that “today we’re being asked by Reform to vote for a leader who is not here - an absent group leader with absent policies”. Ouch.

Stratford’s Reform councillor James Crocker previously promised the Herald that the party would liven up some of the dull meetings at council, so we’re looking forward to many more custard pies coming out in due course.