History made as first ever Lib Dem Mayor is elected

Yesterday evening the Haringey Council AGM took place, with key decisions made on who will be running our borough for the next few years, and how this will work. We are writing to you with an update on the outcome of that meeting and what this means for Haringey.

As you will have likely seen, the elections earlier this month left the council in ‘No Overall Control’, meaning no single political party commands a majority.

Due to big gains, largely in Tottenham, the Greens are now the largest party, followed by Labour, then the Liberal Democrats. Since polling day two resignations mean one Green and one Labour seat have also become vacant, and by-elections will take place in due course.

Following the outcome of the election, we held discussions with both parties, but it quickly became clear that there was no desire to form a joint administration in any shape through an agreement between two parties.

As such, at last night’s AGM, on the vote for Leader of the Council, the Green Party - as the party with the most councillors - put forward their Group Leader, Mark Blake. The Labour and Liberal Democrat Groups did not put forward alternative leaders because neither had enough support to win a vote.  

Cllr Blake was therefore voted in as Leader of the Council by his own Green group members with both the Labour and Liberal Democrat groups abstaining on the vote. This means that the Green Party will run Haringey under a minority administration as of today. This gives them the ability to run the council and determine day-to-day decisions, but also means that they will have to ensure they have political support on major decisions, such as the budget, from either ourselves or the Labour Party (or both).

We believe that given voters gave no single party a clear mandate for running Haringey, that this is to the benefit of residents, as it should lead to more collaborative decision-making at the council, and stronger outcomes.

Whilst we have our first ever Green Party Leader of Haringey Council, we are very pleased to say that we also made further history last night, with Liberal Democrat councillor for Fortis Green, Dawn Barnes, voted in as Mayor of Haringey for the coming year. She becomes the first non-Labour Mayor for over 50 years, and the first ever Liberal Democrat Mayor.

We congratulate Dawn on getting the support of councillors last night to become Haringey’s First Citizen. Having been a councillor for eight years, and community campaigner for many years prior to that, she has given a huge amount to Haringey, and it is richly deserved. She will make an excellent ambassador.

As Mayor she will also chair meetings of Full Council for the next year. This will be a key role given that no party holds the balance of power, and we are pleased that a member of the Liberal Democrat group has been entrusted to take on this position, rather than a member from the administration.

It was also agreed by a further vote, that the Chair positions for a number of key council committees will be held by members of opposition parties. As Liberal Democrats we believe any council that uses a Strong Leader/Cabinet model, as Haringey does, should not have the administration being in charge of marking its own homework. This agreement will ensure that decision-making is more democratic and decentralised, and that a minority administration does not hold 100% of the power in Haringey.

As the third largest group on the council, we will be working over the next four years on achieving the priorities we set out in our manifesto: improving the council’s dire customer service; fixing the finances; and ending the disrepair and voids scandals in Haringey’s council homes; to name just three. We are always ready to work with any and all parties in order to improve the lives of the residents who elected us.