Conservatives Lose Control Of Burgess Hill Town Council On A Night Of Election Shocks!

The Conservative Party have sensationally lost control of Burgess Hill Town Council to the Liberal Democrats following a night of shocks at the count for the local elections where Burgess Hill Uncovered's Peter Chapman was elected onto both Mid Sussex District Council and Burgess Hill Town Council as an Independent.


Mr BHU - The big winner!

In his 15th year of running Burgess Hill Uncovered - and his first time of standing for election onto the town and district councils - Peter defeated the Conservatives by the widest margin in all of the wards, nearly tripling the votes achieved by the previous incumbents.

Coming into the elections, the Conservatives held 17 of the 18 town council seats, but by the end of Friday night they were reduced to just 2 seats as the Lib Dems benefitted from the town centre, public library and Martlets Hall controversies to win 11 seats - giving them an overal majority. The Green Party also won their first ever seats on the town council, 4 of them.

The composition of Burgess Hill Town Council is now:

Liberal Democrats: 11
Green Party: 4
Conservative Party: 2
Independent: 1


Some of the victorious Liberal Democrat candidates

As for Mid Sussex District Council, The Conservatives' 53-1 majority was cut to 34-20 as a large portion of seats fell to the Liberal Democrats in Hassocks, Hurstpierpoint and Burgess Hill.

Of the 12 seats representing Burgess Hill on MSDC, 7 went to the Liberal Democrats, 2 to the Green Party, 2 to the Conservatives and a seat for Mr BHU himself, Peter Chapman (Independent)

The composition of Mid Sussex District Council is now:

Conservative Party: 34
Liberal Democrats: 13
Independents: 4
Green Party: 3

Here are some photos of various election winners taken during Friday night's count at the Triangle Leisure Centre:







This is just the best to finish...

View this post on Instagram

I'm so proud of this photo. Myself and Janice Henwood worked so hard together for the last 4 years battling the old council when Janice was the only opposition councillor out of 18. Now I've been elected and Janice has been reelected and we can have a huge influence in how the town moves forward now that the Conservatives have been reduced from 17 councillors to just 2. It shows that if you get complacent and put your party before the people, eventually the public will turn on you, and my God did they last night! Exciting times ahead! #BurgessHill

A post shared by Burgess Hill Uncovered (@burgesshilluncovered) on May 4, 2019 at 1:03am PDT

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