County council is set to be Reform-ed after landslide!

Historic success for Farage's party sees them land 49 seats

- Phil Corrigan

REFORM UK have won an historic landslide victory in the Staffordshire County Council elections.

Nigel Farage's party took a firm grip of the authority following Thursday's poll, winning 49 out of 62 seats - Reform had previously never won a single seat in the county.

The previously dominant Conservatives, who had been in charge at Staffordshire since 2009, were reduced to just 10 councillors - their worst ever result - while Labour could only manage one win across the county. One Green and one independent were also elected.

At the County Showground in Stafford last night, Mr Farage told his councillors: "The result clearly spells the end of two-party politics as we've known it all our life. But actually there is something much more significant happening in these shires. Here in the heart of England and in many other places too, these are the areas the Conservative Party has relied on forever.

"These are the areas where they have councillors, these area are where the activists work with the councillors, areas where they have strong fundraising, strong branches, strong membership."

He added: "We are witnessing the death of a party that has been around for almost 200 years. They cannot, they will not recover from that position.

"They are over, they are finished, they have literally been gutted in these counties, it is a position from which they will never, ever recover.