High emotion on day it crumbled for Labour group

LABOUR'S Nicky Brennan fluctuated between tears and smiles, a need for supportive hugs and a need to be alone, as she paced the results hall in Birmingham's Utilita Arena waiting to hear her fate.

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She embodied the desperate emotions that lay behind every result declared during a tumultous local election count for Birmingham City Council.

Each ward outcome read out by returning officer Robert Connelly over an exhausting 13 hours was not just a party political triumph or failure.

It was also a person’s livelihood, hopes and sometimes a life’s work lost or gained in the full public glare. In the end an emotional Brennan found out she had won her seat in Bournville and Cotteridge by the tiniest of margins - three votes.