Zetland Ward By Election Results: Lib Dem Gain After Reform Candidate Withdrawal Deepens Labour Setbacks

The Liberal Democrats have taken the Zetland seat on Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council, a result that sharpens scrutiny on both Reform’s local campaign and Labour’s recent run of defeats. The zetland ward by election results matter now because they form part of a cluster of losses for Labour this week and unfolded amid controversy over a Reform UK candidate’s social media history.

Zetland Ward By Election Results — Development details

Alison Barnes won the council by-election in Zetland with just over half of the votes cast. Turnout in the ward was 26. 78%, with 886 ballot papers counted. Labour’s candidate received 191 votes, roughly 22% of the total, while the candidate associated with Reform finished with 119 votes, about 13%, followed by Green and Conservative candidates.

The contest was overshadowed by the presence on the ballot of a Reform candidate whom the party had publicly disassociated from after offensive social media posts were unearthed. The candidate remained on the ballot because it was too late to replace him; he finished behind Labour. The party stated that, had he been elected, he would not have been permitted to sit as a party councillor. Local campaign activity on his behalf had been suspended, and he said he had resigned his membership.

Barnes said she was "really, really pleased" with the result and pledged to prioritise potholes and grass verges. She previously represented the ward between 2019 and 2023 and lost her seat in the most recent round of local elections. She added that, despite not holding office in the interim, she had continued to work in the area and that that local engagement had been important to the campaign.

Context and pressure points

The Zetland outcome is one of three by-election defeats for Labour this week, with seats also lost in Leicester and Caerphilly. The trio of losses—Plaid Cymru and the Greens taking two other wards while the Liberal Democrats won here—means three council seats changed hands away from Labour in a short span. What makes this notable is the geographical spread: the setbacks occurred in different regions, suggesting local dynamics rather than a single isolated factor.

The Reform candidate controversy in Zetland added an acute local pressure point. Concerns were raised before polling that the election could have required a rerun if the candidate had won but refused to sign the papers needed to take up the councillor role. That procedural uncertainty heightened attention on the contest and on how parties manage candidate vetting and discipline in tightly fought wards.

Immediate impact

The immediate winners are the Liberal Democrats and Alison Barnes personally, who recaptured a seat she had previously held. Labour’s local position has been weakened by this loss and the two others this week, reducing the party’s tally on the councils where those contests took place and intensifying local-level scrutiny of party performance.

For Reform, the episode represents reputational cost and organisational disruption: a candidate publicly disowned by the party stayed on the ballot and finished behind Labour, while local campaigning was suspended. The candidate’s online posts were described as containing insulting material directed at Jewish and Muslim communities, and that description contributed to his effective exclusion from the party’s ranks.

For residents of Zetland, the result brings a change in representation and an explicit promise of attention to everyday issues such as potholes and verges. Voter engagement was modest at just under 27% turnout, a factor that shapes the mandate and the council’s immediate working dynamics.

Forward outlook

In the short term, Alison Barnes will take her seat on the council and begin working on the local priorities she campaigned on. Parties will also be reviewing candidate selection and campaign oversight after the controversy that marked this contest. The recent run of by-election defeats for Labour adds urgency to those internal reviews ahead of other scheduled contests: a parliamentary by-election in Gorton and Denton is due next week, presenting the next electoral test for parties on the ground.

The clustering of by-election losses means party strategists will be monitoring forthcoming results closely for patterns they can act on. The broader implication is that local campaigns and candidate management are likely to receive heightened attention from national and local party teams alike, with confirmed milestones in the coming days serving as the immediate measures of whether recent trends persist.