2021_Wirral_Metropolitan_Borough_Council_election

2021 Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council election

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The 2021 Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council election took place on 6 May 2021 to elect members of Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council in England.^[11] This election was held on the same day as other local elections. The election was originally due to take place in May 2020, but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[12] This delay meant those elected (excluding the by-election) would serve only a three-year term.

Main article: 2021 United Kingdom local elections

Quick Facts 23 of 66 seats (One Third and one by-election)to Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council 34 seats needed for a majority, Turnout ...

2021 Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council election

← 2019

6 May 2021

2022 →

23 of 66 seats (One Third and one by-election)
to Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council
34 seats needed for a majority

Turnout

36.0% (

1.1%)

	First party	Second party

Leader	Janette Williamson^[1]	Jeff Green^[2]
Party	Labour	Conservative
Leader since	29 June 2020 (2020-06-29)^[3]	22 December 2020 (2020-12-22)^[4]
Leader's seat	Liscard	West Kirby and Thurstaston
Last election	10 seats, 35.8%	8 seats, 32.1%
Seats before	32	22
Seats won	10	8
Seats after	30	23
Seat change	2	1
Popular vote	34,643	29,000
Percentage	39.7%	33.3%
Swing	3.9%	1.2%

	Third party	Fourth party

Leader	Pat Cleary^[5]	Phil Gilchrist^[6]
Party	Green	Liberal Democrats
Leader since	22 May 2014 (2014-05-22)^[7]	16 May 2013 (2013-05-16)^[8]
Leader's seat	Birkenhead and Tranmere	Eastham
Last election	2 seats, 16.7%	2 seats, 11.6%
Seats before	2	6
Seats won	3	2
Seats after	5	6
Seat change	3
Popular vote	13,915	8,788
Percentage	16.0%	10.1%
Swing	0.7%	1.5%

Map of results of 2021 election

Leader of the Council before election

Janette Williamson (Labour)^[9]
No Overall Control

Leader of the Council after election

Janette Williamson (Labour)^[10]
No Overall Control

After the election, the composition of the council was:

More information Party, Seats ...

Party		Seats	±
	Labour	30	2
	Conservative	23	1
	Liberal Democrat	6
	Green	5	2
	Independent	2	2
Source: The Guardian^[13]

Election results

Overall election result

Overall result compared with 2019.

More information Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council election result, 2021, Party ...

Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council election result, 2021

Party		Candidates						Votes
Party		Stood	Elected	Gained	Unseated	Net	% of total	%	No.	Net %
	Labour	23	10	1	3	2	40.9	39.7	34,643	3.9
	Conservative	23	8	1	0	1	36.4	33.3	29,000	1.2
	Green	23	3	3	0	3	13.6	16.0	13,915	0.7
	Liberal Democrats	23	2	0	0		9.1	10.1	8,788	1.5
	Independent	1	0	0	2	2	0.0	0.6	547	0.8
	Reform UK	4	0	0	0		0.0	0.3	249	New
	For Britain	1	0	0	0		0.0	0.1	67	New

^[14] ^{[n 1]}

Changes in council composition

Prior to the election the composition of the council was:^[15]

↓
32	22	6	2	4
Lab	Con	LD	G	Ind

After the election the composition of the council was:^[13]

↓
30	23	6	5	2
Lab	Con	LD	G	I

Parties and candidates

Contesting political parties

More information Party, Leader ...

Party		Leader	Leader since	Leader's ward	Up for re-election?	Last election		This election
Party		Leader	Leader since	Leader's ward	Up for re-election?	% of votes	Wards	Defending	Prior Composition^[15]
	Labour	Janette Williamson	29 June 2020	Liscard	N	35.8%	10	11	32 / 66
	Conservative	Jeff Green	22 December 2020	West Kirby and Thurstaston	N	32.1%	8	7	22 / 66
	Liberal Democrats	Phil Gilchrist	16 May 2013	Eastham	Y	11.6%	2	2	6 / 66
	Green	Pat Cleary	22 May 2014	Birkenhead and Tranmere	N	16.7%	2	0	2 / 66
	Independent	Moira McLaughlin	22 February 2019^[16]	Rock Ferry	N	1.4%	0	2	4 / 66

2020 Candidate selection

In August 2019, incumbent Labour councillor for Prenton Tony Norbury was not approved for candidacy by the Local campaign forum thus was unable to seek re-selection.^[17] Former Prenton councillor Angie Davies, who lost her seat in May to the Green's Chris Cooke, was selected as the new Labour candidate in October.^[18] The Greens are fielding Harry Gorman who was selected in June.^[19]^[20]

Tom Usher, then youngest member of council and cabinet member for Children and Families, lost a selection contest in his Liscard Labour branch in October to Dave Brennan by 21 votes to 30.^[21] This was criticised by Independent group leader, and former Labour councillor, Moira McLaughlin who perceived Usher as having been "booted out by the hard-left". Liscard labour chair Edwina Doyle dismissed this notion putting the result down to Usher being "a bit younger and less experienced [than Brennan]". In January 2020, he was selected to contest the neighboring, Conservative held, ward of Wallasey.^[22]

Conservative councillor Chris Blakeley died of cancer on 15 January.^[23] A casual vacancy was announced on 6 February with the seat to be filled at the upcoming election when Blakeley's term was due to end.^[24] Simon Mountney, who had served alongside Blakeley as a fellow ward councillor from 2004 to 2014, was selected as the Conservative candidate in March.^[25]^[26] Though he was replaced by Max Booth the following January after the elections had been rescheduled.^[27] Mountney was later selected to contest the West Kirby and Thurstaston ward.^[28]

The Conservatives posted an appeal for candidates on Twitter on 17 February for wards in the Wallasey and Birkenhead constituencies.^[29]

2021 Candidate selection

Chase Newton was selected as the Lib Dem candidate for Bromborough on 23 July 2020 succeeding Vicky Downie who stood down due to personal reasons.^[30] Downie had been the party's candidate in the ward for the previous three elections.^[31]

Former Labour Councillor Bill Davies resigned his seat in September with a casual vacancy announced on the 7th.^[32]

Conservative councillor Geoffrey Watt died on 24 September 2020 after a short illness.^[33]

Campaign

On 24 February, Leader of the Council Pat Hackett announced he was standing down as both leader and councillor for New Brighton later in the year.^[34] This was, however, to be in July after the election was scheduled.^[35] Hackett was succeeded as Leader of the Labour Group by his deputy Janette Williamson on 29 June 2020.^[3]^[36] She was voted in as Leader of the Council in a virtual meeting on 28 September.^[9] Hackett later resigned his seat in September.^[37]

A leaked internal Labour report released on 3 March 2020 predicted severe losses for the party at the upcoming local elections across the country.^[38] Wirral, however, was one of only two authorities (the other being Burnley) seen as a possible gain for Labour with Wirral being the only positive prediction under all models used within the report.^[39]

On 13 March it was announced that all elections due to be held in May would be suspended until the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[12]

An e-newsletter created by the Oxton Labour Party revealed that it and the rest of the Birkenhead constituency party were not delivering leaflets due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.^[40]

Leader of the Conservative group Ian Lewis resigned on 15 December 2020 citing internal party problems.^[41] Lewis's predecessor Jeff Green was elected leader on 22 December beating controversial Greasby, Frankby and Irby councillor David Burgess-Joyce.^[4]

Retiring councillors

More information Ward, Departing Councillor ...

Ward	Departing Councillor		Ref.
Birkenhead and Tranmere	Jean Stapleton^[42]	Labour	^[18]
Leasowe and Moreton East	Anita Leech^[43]	Labour	^[44]
Moreton West and Saughall Massie	Chris Blakeley^[45]	Conservative (died on 15 January 2020)	^[23]
Pensby and Thingwall	Mike Sullivan^[46]	Independent	^[47]
Prenton	Tony Norbury^[48]	Labour (deselected)	^[17]^[18]
New Brighton	Pat Hackett^[49]	Labour (retired on 30 September 2020)	^[37]
Rock Ferry	Bill Davies^[50]	Independent (retired on 7 September 2020; died later that year)	^[32]^[47]
West Kirby and Thurstaston	Geoffrey Watt^[51]	Conservative (died on 24 September 2020)	^[33]