Members of minority communities in Birmingham and elsewhere fear results could lead to rise in hostile rhetoric
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onceding defeat at the election count at Birmingham’s Utilita Arena on Friday, the outgoing Labour leader of the city council, John Cotton, made a plea. “What I would encourage the next administration in this city to do, whatever form that administration takes, is that it ensures it champions the diversity of this city,” he said.
Labour’s 14-year rule of the local authority had come to a crashing end, with Reform emerging as the largest party with 22 councillors so far, followed by the Greens on 19, albeit both parties a long way off the 51 needed for a majority.
Labour lost more than 1,400 councillors across the local elections in England on Thursday and lost power in Wales for the first time. Nigel Farage described the election results, in which Labour also lost ground in Scotland, as a “truly historic shift in British politics”.
