Metropol

There is nothing in the rules which stop her keeping both,

Steve in Pudsey wrote:

WillPS wrote:Well all this hoopla in Doncaster can't be helping the English Democrats.

Plus the interview that their excuse for a mayor did with Radio Sheffield's Toby Foster on the day after his election (when Toby went through his manifesto and pointed out that much of it would be illegal to implement) has been nominated for a Sony Award. http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/sheffield/h ... 611170.stm

Fantastic! The best bit of journalism I've ever heard from local radio. What a tosspot!!

He didn't even answer questions following his reading of a "not my fault" speech.

It would be amusing if Toby won the Sony - he's a stand up comedian rather than a trained journo (although I'm sure the interview was thoroughly prepped by journos) and is up against people like Eddie Mair and Victoria Derbyshire

To be fair, I think whoever had carried out that interview would have received the same praise - it's what happens when someone is unexpectedly propelled into a position of power and then can't actually stand the scrutiny of the microscope.

I may be biased though because I cannot stand Toby Foster and have never been that bowled over with his performances on the Radio Sheffield breakfast show. Theat and I guess I had other work related axes to grind when I worked up in Rotherham a few years ago, but that's best left off a public forum.

Going back to the candidate here who is also standing for re-election to the council, she took part in a web chat on the local rag's website today, so I and others took the opportunity to ask some awkward questions.

She plans to serve as both MP and councillor if she wins both elections, and acknowledges that she will have to make compromises if meetings/debates/votes for the council and for Westminster clash, but doesn't rule out defying a three line whip if attending something as councillor was more important. So far so good.

But, she plans to take both the £60k+ salary as an MP and the £12k allowance from the council, despite the fact she openly admits that she can't give both jobs her full attention. This seems like political suicide in the light of the expenses scandal. I had been seriously considering putting my X in her box, but no longer.

Ah well, guess I'm back to being a floating voter. It's a real pain - I think the Tory candidate will do a good job locally but I have issues with their manifesto, and I like many Lib Dem policies, but I don't feel I can support the local candidate in the light of the revelation above.

Any signs of whats happening in the local election?

Well in the local English elections the tories has lose control of 9 councils: whats even stranger is labour pick up 5 council to this point of time: Coventry, Doncaster, Enfield, hartlepool, and the big one Liverpool !

with a high chance of Lincoln, becoming Labour aswell plus 1 lib dem.

Labour were starting from an all time low in terms of control of councils. Last time in 2006 they were virtually wiped off the local government map, controlling less than 1 in 4 authorities.

Labour will have benefited from the polls being on the same day as a general election which has boosted the turnout.

BNP lose all 12 seats on Barking & Dagenham council. In Epping Forest the party lost three councillors, in Sandwell it lost two, in Leeds one BNP councillor was voted out.

Bye bye Griffin!

Locally speaking there was a particularly interesting result as my constituency went to the Conservatives from Labour with a decent majority. However, local elections have seen Labour take a few more seats and have now put the council into no overall control with Labour the largest party. I know it makes a difference as the entire council wasn't up for re-election but interesting how things can seem to go against each other.

The reality is, it's happened because the borough council is a larger area which features areas which have always been staunch Labour and it just so happens that the councillors in these areas who were Tory last time when the party was riding high nationally have returned to Labour. High turnout, as Square Eyes indicates also helps.