Hertfordshire County Council election: Conservative leader Richard Roberts says Reform vote ‘skewed’ result

The Conservatives lost control of Hertfordshire County Council in the May 1 election – but polling data shows that overall they got just 345 fewer votes than the new largest party at County Hall.

Of the 285,000 residents – just 32% of the eligible number – who turned out to elect the 78 new county councillors, 74,078 cast voted Liberal Democrat. That was enough to win the party 31 seats, or divisions.

The Conservatives, who saw their seats plummet from 42 to 22, polled 73,733 votes across the county overall. And Reform, who won 14 seats, received 68,614 votes – which means fewer than 5,500 votes separated the three parties.

Labour received a county-wide total of 38,842 votes and Green Party candidates – who stood in 76 of the 78 seats – secured 26,475 votes.

There were several close races across the county, with some candidates winning by fewer than 10 votes. In Bishop’s Stortford Rural, Conservative Mark Pope won by just seven from Reform’s Jonathan Grose after a recount.

Conservative Cllr Richard Roberts, who retained his King’s Langley seat by 303 votes from a Reform runner-up and remains leader of the county council until the next full meeting of the authority, said the election was “unique”.

Highlighting Reform taking around 1,000 votes in many seats previously held by Conservatives, he said that he was not surprised that the split in votes cast overall was so close.

“This was an extraordinary election,” he said. “The main parties have never polled so low nationally, and it was a three-, four- and sometimes five-way fight for seats. We’ve never had that before.”

Cllr Roberts suggested that the support for Reform was “a protest vote – very definitely against the established parties of Conservative and Labour”.

He said it was also “a response to the message Reform gave”. And he claimed that “skewed” the election.

“The picture could have been very different,” he said. “I’m not saying that we would have had overall control. But in Hertfordshire the Reform vote has skewed the election. And the Liberal Democrats now face forming a coalition.”

Liberal Democrat group leader Cllr Steve Jarvis said: “Clearly we were pleased to be first and we would have liked to have been first by more than that.

“It’s another demonstration that the electoral system that we have isn’t fair and that it really ought to change. And that would change the way in which people voted as well. It would mean a much wider section of the population was represented. There would also be a need for compromise and joint working.”

Cllr Jarvis said that the voting system should reflect the relative support given to each party.

Reform UK regional director Dave Holland said: “I think what we’re seeing from these results is that the legacy parties are no longer having everything their own way.

“In some instances there was a four-way battle going on for seats, which is why we’re seeing numbers that are as close as they are.”

Mr Holland said the party ranked second in a “huge” number of seats across the county. He suggested that the results were “incredibly encouraging”.