THE Worcester Green Party leader has thrown cold water on the idea of a coalition with Labour after the Conservatives lost their majority following the city council elections.

Councillor Louis Stephen said he and his party “favour the committee system” over any kind of coalition but added: “We are willing to talk about what the best steps are for the city.”

In what was the biggest upset following Thursday’s election, Green candidate Marjory Bisset won St Stephen ward with almost 58 per cent of the vote, toppling Tory opponent Councillor Gareth Jones.

Fellow Green councillor Neil Laurenson holds the other St Stephen seat, while Matthew Jenkins, also Green, represents the division on the county council.

Along with Cllr Stephen, who holds one of two Battenhall seats, the Greens have three representatives on the city council.

If they were to form a coalition with Labour, which has 15 seats, the alliance would take overall control from the Tories, who have 17.

Council leader and Conservative Marc Bayliss retained his seat in Bedwardine but was quick to rule out any possibility of a coalition immediately after the count.

Though Adrian Gregson, deputy leader of the council and leader of the council’s Labour group, said: “We’ll have to see how things work out over the next few days.”

Speaking later on Friday, Cllr Stephen said: “Obviously, we are willing to talk about what the best steps are for the city. We have a committee system in Worcester, which means all parties are working together. We favour the committee system.”

He went to describe Cllr Bisset’s win as a “fantastic result” and said it was a seat the Greens had targeted.

“It’s clearly a very bad night for both the Conservatives and Labour. They have lost a massive amount of voters.”

He said the St Stephens seat was won through “hard work” but insisted it was not a “flash in the pan” victory, rather “we have worked for the residents all year round”.

Gaining the seat was “about completing the team” in order to work better for residents in the ward and “was one of the points we were campaigning on”.

He said councillors Bisset, Laurenson and Jenkins will “make a formidable team”.

Cllr Stephen said the other big plus for the Greens at the elections was how close Andrew Cross ran Conservative Lucy Hodgson in Warndon Parish South, with just 34 votes in it.

Cllr Stephen put that down to the Greens having been “active in the area for a long time”.

He described Cllr Cross, who holds a seat on Warndon Parish Council, as “very active on social media” and described him as a “nice guy – I think people warm to that. It was a personable vote as well as a step forward for the party”.