Following the results of the May 2021 local elections, Portsmouth City Council is once again under No Overall Control with no party having enough councillors to form a majority. In light of this, and based on a desire to prevent the authority falling into Tory control, the Labour Group has entered into discussions with the Liberal Democrat Group as to the future of the council leadership.

During these discussions the Labour Group has presented the manifesto we put to local voters in the elections and identified four key policies from that manifesto we would like to work together with a new administration to see prioritised:

• Carers and other outsourced council workers to be paid the living wage by April 2022.
• Organise a citizen’s assembly on climate change to develop a consensus on how we achieve net-zero carbon by 2030.
• Rethink the Tipner regeneration project to avoid destroying the environment, increase the levels of social housing and improve the connections to the city.
• Bring over £30m of council contracts for services, such as housing repairs and refuse collection, back in-house.

As it stands we have unfortunately not received any substantive response to this offer of cross-party working but remain hopeful that one will be forthcoming in advance of the council AGM on Tuesday.

We have received notification that a Motion of No Confidence in the current council leader has been submitted for discussion at the AGM by the Conservative Group. The Labour Group will vote against such a motion in order to prevent the Tories taking control of the council.

Leader of the Labour Group, Councillor George Fielding said:

“Portsmouth Labour Party is proud to have been the only local party to publish a detailed election manifesto specifying how we would achieve our vision of a fairer, greener Portsmouth. We are a growing group with an increased vote share across the city and the wealth of knowledge and experience from Labour councils, mayors and MPs nationwide. We will press the new administration on these policies and look forward to working with other councillors, council officers and local residents in the coming year to put those ideas into practice.”

The full Portsmouth Labour 2021 local election manifesto can be viewed online here