THE future of Basingstoke and Deane is again on a knife-edge after the Conservatives narrowly failed to gain an overall majority in Thursday's borough council elections.

Although the party members were in a victorious mood after gaining two seats, their group was unable to achieve an overall majority. The Tories now hold 30 of the council's 60 seats.

The Labour/Liberal Democrat administration that has run Basingstoke and Deane since 1995 was left with a combined 27 seats - down from the 29 it had before the elections. The Liberal Democrats are on 15 and Labour has 12 seats.

This means the three Independent councillors effectively still hold the balance of power.

Despite this, Conservative leaders have vowed to fight for overall control of the council, believing that the extra seats and several huge majorities the Tories gained show they are the party favoured by most of the electorate.

Conservative group leader Councillor John Leek said he did not want to see power shared between the three parties, and will try to bring an Independent on board to achieve the necessary majority for the Tories.

He told The Gazette: "We believe we have a mandate to take control of the council and that is what we will do.

"We may need the support of one of the Independent councillors but we believe we should, and must, take control."

A night of election drama saw the Conservatives take an early lead by winning a Labour-held Winklebury seat.

The Liberal Democrats then suffered the defeat of Alan Read in Basing ward and failed to retain the Popley East seat vacated by controversial councillor Ian Powney, which was won back by Labour.

Despite their losses, members of the joint administration are also likely to go in for behind-the-scenes deal-making with the Independents.

Council leader Cllr Paul Harvey stayed tight-lipped about what might happen in the two weeks before the crunch meeting on May 18 when the vote on who runs the council will be taken.

But Labour group leader Cllr David Potter said: "I have asked the Independents to think hard about their position in all of this. They have worked effectively with us in the last few months."

Liberal Democrat group leader John Shaw said: "We were disappointed to lose Basing and it is sad to lose Alan Read because he is a fantastically experienced councillor who has given a great deal."

Apart from the defeat of Criss Connor in Winklebury, Labour endured further disappointments with candidates coming bottom of the pile in some wards - several failing to gain as many as 100 votes.

But party leaders said the low results, mainly in rural areas, were not unexpected, and they were pleased with their big gains in strongholds such as South Ham and Norden.

Cllr Potter said: "The reality is, of course, that we have always recognised that our strength is within the urban areas, and where we were fighting to retain seats in most of those areas, our votes stacked up well and increased."

Cllr Harvey added: "It is disappointing to lose such a good councillor as Criss Connor. I was bitterly disappointed.

"But we lost a seat and gained a seat so I think the overall picture was about Basingstoke bucking the national trend for Labour."

Although the Green Party failed to win any seats on its debut in the borough council elections, party members were upbeat about the future.

Darren Shirley, who stood for the party in Eastrop, said: "I am very pleased with the results. We started from nothing so we made gains.

"We have got a base to go from for next year - it is just the beginning for the Green Party in Basingstoke."

First published: Thursday, May 4, 2006