{"id":71771,"date":"2026-05-15T11:36:02","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T11:36:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shefnews.co.uk\/?p=71771"},"modified":"2026-05-15T11:44:47","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T11:44:47","slug":"reform-uk-have-taken-barnsley-council-after-50-years-of-labour-leadership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shefnews.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/05\/15\/reform-uk-have-taken-barnsley-council-after-50-years-of-labour-leadership\/","title":{"rendered":"Reform UK name local leaders after historic Barnsley Council win"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In the recent local elections, Reform UK took control of Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council, with a total of 42 seats in the town hall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the council\u2019s all-out elections, Reform gained enough to take control of the council\u2019s decision-making.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.barnsley.gov.uk\/news\/reform-uk-group-in-barnsley-chooses-a-leader-and-deputy-leader\/\">Councillor William Brown has been selected by the group as Leader<\/a>, and Councillor Edward Dillingham as Deputy Leader.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Election polls had ambitiously predicted 37 seats for Reform, but very few could have predicted the sheer dominance of Reform. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The reality was even worse for the Labour Party, which lost 35 seats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Both parties have admitted qualms with the central Labour Party, and specifically, Kier Starmer, which have overshadowed local politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Calls for Starmer to resign are getting significantly stronger as over a thousand councillors have lost their jobs, seemingly due to his leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nigel Farage, leader of Reform, said: \u201cWhat\u2019s happened is a truly historic shift in British politics.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The current leader of Barnsley Council, Sir Stephen Houghton (Labour), held his seat by just 23 votes, but this Reform win has ended his 30-year tenure as council leader.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He, said: \u201cI will pick up the pieces and represent my residents the best way I can.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The make-up of the town hall has now completely changed. Reform UK have 42 seats, and Labour now form the official opposition with 11, Lib Dems with 8 and two independents. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Barnsley no longer has any Conservative councillors after Robert Barnard lost his seat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This all-out election marks the first time the council has had all its seats up for vote in over 20 years. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Barnsley council has been reshaped due to the results of the recent local council elections.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":820,"featured_media":71127,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[21,50],"tags":[25,625,49,131],"class_list":["post-71771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-politics","tag-barnsley","tag-election","tag-politics","tag-south-yorkshire"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - 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