The new balance of power on Cambridge City Council

Following yesterday’s local elections, Cambridge City Council now has a delicate balance of power. The Lib Dems hold 21 seats, as do the combined opposition, with 19 Labour, one Conservative and one Independent:

While this is technically No Overall Control, in practice the Lib Dems will retain effective control of the council, barring any defections or other unexpected events. Under the Local Government Act, the outgoing Mayor, Lib Dem Ian Nimmo-Smith, keeps the right to vote until his successor is appointed, which means that the Lib Dems will be able to ensure that a Lib Dem mayor is elected at the next council meeting on May 24th. This new Mayor will wield a casting vote, so with the Council split 21-21 the Lib Dems will still get their way, and they can continue to decide the Leader, Executive and policy of the council. Of course, this depends entirely on all the Lib Dem councillors, and the outgoing Mayor, actually turning up. If anything should happen to prevent Ian Nimmo-Smith from chairing the next council meeting, his Labour deputy Caroline Hart would replace him in the chair, and things would turn out very differently. I’m sure he is being careful to look both ways when crossing the road.

When the next City Council elections are held in May 2014, however, things will look very different. Fourteen seats, one third of the total, will then be up for election. Of these, the Lib Dems currently hold 11 and Labour just three, which means the situation will be as follows (hollow blocks are seats up for election):

Labour will go into the elections already holding 16 seats, and will need to win just six more of the 14 to be guaranteed control. This year they won eight. By contrast, the Lib Dems will only have ten seats left, and will need to win eleven seats even to keep control on the Mayor’s casting vote. This year they won just four. While a lot can happen politically in two years, it seems almost impossible that the Lib Dems will keep control, and extremely likely that Labour will win a clear majority in 2014.

However, this is still some way off. In the meantime, one other interesting question is what effect the elections have had on the political balance of the Area Committees. There are four of these in Cambridge; they deal with local issues in particular parts of the city. The Lib Dems used to control three of them, but not any more.

The North area, which covers Arbury, Kings Hedges and East and West Chesterton is now evenly split between the Lib Dems and Labour:

In the East (Abbey, Coleridge, Petersfield and Romsey), Labour have extended their grip:

Following Labour’s shock win from the Lib Dems in Queen Edith’s, and the Conservative win in Trumpington, the Lib Dems no longer control the South area, which covers these wards plus Cherry Hinton:

Only in the West/Central area do the Lib Dems still have a majority, with just Independent councillor John Hipkin to keep them company:

Whatever else may happen over the next couple of years, they are certain to be politically very challenging for the Cambridge Lib Dems.

Cambridge vote shares visualised

Here is a graphic showing the share of the vote in the Cambridge local elections in each ward compared with last year:

This shows the substantial shift in the share of the vote in some of the wards.

Cambridge local elections – the results

The Cambridge local election results are all in now, and the detailed results are available on the City Council website. It was a tough night for the Lib Dems – they lost East Chesterton, Kings Hedges and Queen Edith’s to Labour and Trumpington to the Conservatives. Labour also took Abbey from the Greens, and the other Green councillor in Abbey announced his defection to Labour.

This graphic shows the swing from the Lib Dems to Labour in each ward since last year’s elections:

This graphic doesn’t tell the whole story of the election; the Conservatives won Trumpington ward and Independent councillor John Hipkin held his seat in Castle. But it does show the significantly different swing in the vote in different seats – the Lib Dems managed to swim against the tide in Romsey, Newnham and Market, but did particularly badly in Arbury and Queen Edith’s – the latter being the most unexpected result of the night.

The Lib Dems now have 21 councillors, with 19 for Labour, one Conservative and one Independent. Since the outgoing mayor is Lib Dem, the party can elect a new Lib Dem mayor and ensure continued control of the council on the Mayor’s casting vote.

The next City Council elections will be in May 2014, when the councillors elected in 2010 will be up for re-election. That year was a particularly good one for the Liberal Democrats; they won 11 seats, with Labour winning just two, and the Greens one (who yesterday defected to Labour). This means that in order to retain control, the Lib Dems will need to win all 11 of the seats they are defending. After last night’s results, this looks very close to impossible, and it is now almost certain that Labour will take control of the council at the next elections.

What does Cllr Pogonowski’s defection mean for Cambridge City Council?

As I write the polls are still open for the Cambridge local elections, but there has already been one gain for Labour – Cllr Pogonowski, Green councillor for Abbey ward, has announced that he is defecting to the Labour party. Cllr Pogonowski is not standing for election this year – his term does not expire until 2014 – but what does this mean for the balance of power on the City Council?

Here is the graphic from my earlier article which shows which party would control the Council depending on how many seats Labour and the Lib Dems win today:

The numbers across the top indicate the seats won by Labour and the Lib Dems respectively, and the coloured squares show who would have control of the council. Here is an updated graphic showing the position after Cllr Pogonowski’s defection:

In both cases I am assuming that Labour will gain the seat in Abbey that is up for election today from the Greens, and that Indepedent councillor John Hipkin will retain his seat in Castle ward.

As you can see, the Lib Dems still only need to win four seats today to retain control of the council on the Mayor’s casting vote. If the Lib Dems win three, and Labour win ten, bringing their overall total to 21, they will still not have guaranteed control, because the other 21 councillors, with the outgoing Lib Dem mayor’s casting vote, could elect a non-Labour mayor. Independent councillor John Hipkin (assuming he is re-elected) would have a crucial role in this scenario. Only if Labour win 11 seats today and the Lib Dems win just two will Cllr Pogonowski’s defection make any difference – it would mean they will now be guaranteed control, whereas before it would have been just outside their grasp. But this is still very much in landslide territory. The position in 2014 outlined in my earlier article is unchanged, as I was assuming that Labour would win Cllr Pogonowski’s seat from the Greens in any case.

We will know the outcome soon enough as the polls close at 10pm.

Does it matter where you are on the ballot paper?

As voters go to the polls on Thursday, they will be presented with ballot papers listing the candidates in alphabetical order of surname. Some candidates feel that appearing higher up the ballot paper is beneficial, as some voters may simply vote for the first acceptable name they see as they scan down the list of candidates. In the 2010 General Election, Labour’s alphabetically-challenged candidiate Daniel Zeichner perhaps did slightly worse than might have been expected. However, the alphabet factor hasn’t prevented councillors named Zmura and Znajek from being elected in Cambridge in recent years.

But what does the data actually show? Are alphabetically-earlier candidates more likely to get elected? To find out, I compared the alphabetical distribution of surnames of Cambridge City Councillors against the population of the Cambridge area as a whole. Here’s the graph:

This graph shows whether surnames beginning with each letter are over- or under-represented in the council chamber, compared with the overall Cambridge area population (based on the number of pages in the residential section of the local phone book). So for example 19% of the councillors have surnames beginning with B, against about 10% of the local population. But while 9% of the local population are listed under C, Rod Cantrill is their lone representative in the chamber.

So what does the graph show us? It certainly doesn’t offer a lot of support to the theory that alphabetically earlier candidates are more likely to get elected. Apart from the bunch of Bs, the first half of the alphabet seems to have a tough time of it on Cambridge City Council – every letter from C to J is underrepresented, whereas the second half of the alphabet definitely has a better showing. Indeed, surnames beginning A to J supply 49% of the local population, but just 36% of the City Councillors.

What is the picture on the County Council? Here’s the graph:

There’s less variation here, as would be expected with the larger number of councillors (69), but it’s still not good news for the earlier part of the alphabet. So it looks like candidates near the bottom of the ballot paper shouldn’t be worrying too much about their electoral disadvantage.

Attendance records of councillors seeking re-election

Eleven City Councillors are seeking re-election at the Cambridge local elections next week. No doubt many factors will influence the voters, but one we can measure easily is how often these councillors have turned up to meetings. The City Council website has detailed attendance records for councillors; here are the figures for the period since this particular batch were elected:

Most of these councillors were elected in May 2008, but Cllrs Znajek and Marchant-Daisley were elected in May 2010 after other councillors stood down early, and Cllr Owers won a by-election in November 2010 after the last Conservative on the Council, Chris Howell, resigned his seat.

There is quite a range in the attendance rate – though the number of meetings that councillors are expected to attend also varies quite a lot. Cllr Owers is top of the table with 32 out of 32, closely followed by Lib Dem executive councillors Smart and McGovern. Council leader Sian Reid is, perhaps surprisingly, some way down the table, having missed 6 of 42 meetings, followed by Independent councillor John Hipkin, who missed 11 of 56, including the latest full Council meeting held last week. Propping up the league are Labour’s Rob Dryden, who missed 24 of 100 meetings in the last four years, and Lib Dem Salah Al Bander, who missed 16 out of 63.

The data doesn’t give any indication of the reasons for meetings being missed; if the council collected this information too, it would help voters evaluate how good a job their elected representatives have been doing.

Can Labour win Cambridge?

There is now less than a fortnight left until Cambridge voters go to the polls to elect one-third of their City Councillors. In my previous article, I described how the Mayor’s casting vote means that the Lib Dems only have to win four of the 14 seats at this year’s elections to retain control of the City Council. Here’s a graphic that summarises the situation:

The numbers across the top show the possible numbers of seats that could be won by the Lib Dems and Labour this year, and the coloured squares below them show which party would then have overall control of the City Council, and the size of their majority. I’m making a few assumptions here to simplify the picture: firstly that Labour will win Abbey from the Greens, secondly that Independent councillor John Hipkin will hold on to his seat in Castle, and thirdly that all the other seats will be won by either Labour or the Lib Dems. I think Abbey is a fairly good bet for Labour; they took the seat from the Greens there last year, this year the incumbent Green councillor is standing down due to illness and the Green party in Cambridge seems to be in some disarray generally. Castle is perhaps less certain, given the volatile state of the student electorate. But John Hipkin’s victory in 2008, when his main rivals the Lib Dems were a good deal more popular nationally than they are now, shows that he can muster the organisation and support necessary to win. The Conservatives will be hoping to do well in Trumpington, but the national picture and their limited local resources are against them.

Given these assumptions, the graphic shows that Labour will need a landslide to take control this year. Even if they win 11 of the 14 seats this time, with just two for the Lib Dems and one Independent, bringing their total to 21, Labour would still need the Mayor’s casting vote to control the Council – but the other 21 councillors, combined with the outgoing Lib Dem mayor’s casting vote, could combine to elect a non-Labour mayor.

But what about Labour’s prospects of winning control at the elections after next? First of all, they will have to wait a while. In 2013 there are no City Council elections; Cambridge will be electing its 14 County Councillors instead. The next elections for the City Council will be held in 2014, when the 14 City Councillors elected in 2010 will be up. That year the Lib Dems won a record 11 seats, with just two for Labour and one for the Greens. With the collapse in Lib Dem support since then, Labour are well-placed to win back several seats. But how many will they need to take control? This graphic shows the position:

Again the numbers across the top show the possible results this year, with the same assumptions as above. The numbers down the side show the possible results in 2014. As with 2012, I am making some assumptions about 2014: that only Labour and the Lib Dems will win any seats; that the Greens will lose to Labour in Abbey, and that there will be no defections or by-elections. I think these are less certain than my earlier assumptions – a lot can happen politically in two years – but still reasonably likely. The coloured squares in the grid show which party would have overall control of the City Council after the 2014 elections, and the size of their majority, for each combination of results in 2012 and 2014.

I’ve highlighted the central area on the assumption that Labour are almost certain to win their four safest seats (Cherry Hinton, Coleridge, Abbey and Petersfield) and the Lib Dems are very likely to hold on to their three safest (Queen Edith’s, Trumpington and West Chesterton), leaving the middle part of the grid as the battleground. However, even within this area, some results seem a good deal more likely than others. My central prediction is that the Lib Dems will win five or six seats this year, keeping control for now, but that at the next elections Labour will win at least seven, and after fourteen years out of office, will regain control of Cambridge City Council on Thursday 1 May 2014.