A Reform UK council leader has resigned just weeks after being elected, leaving an 18-year-old in charge of hundreds of millions of pounds of public spending.
Reform’s Rob Howard said it was with “much regret” that he was quitting as Warwickshire County Council leader, citing health challenges preventing him from “carrying out the role to the level and standard that I would wish”.
It means his deputy, Reform’s 18-year-old George Finch, will take over as interim leader of the council until a permanent replacement is confirmed.
The change means Mr Finch, a former member of the Conservative Party, is now responsible for the council, with £1.5bn of assets and a budget of around £500m.
In his statement, Mr Howard said: “This has been a very difficult decision to take.
“The role of leader is an extremely demanding role and regretfully my health challenges now prevent me from carrying out the role to the level and standard that I would wish.
“I am honoured and privileged to have held the role, even if only for a short time.
“I remain committed to my continued role working as a county councillor for the benefit of Warwickshire residents.”
His resignation comes after chaos in the wake of Reform’s surge at the local elections.
One newly-elected councillor resigned from Reform just days after being elected, having promised to defect from the party anyway after the local elections. Donna Edmunds called for ousted Reform MP Rupert Lowe to establish a challenger party on the right of Reform and said Nigel Farage “must never be prime minister”.
Another, Wayne Titley, who was elected in Staffordshire, quit as a councillor altogether after just two weeks, following criticism of him for a Facebook post about small boats arriving in Britain.
And a Reform councillor who failed to declare he worked for the council, Andrew Kilburn, also announced he would no longer take up his role, forcing a by-election in Durham just over a week after the local elections.
Desmond Clarke, who won in Newark West, also resigned his seat just a week after the vote, forcing a by-election in Nottinghamshire.
But the chaos does not appear to have slowed Reform’s rise in the polls, with a major YouGov poll on Thursday indicating Mr Farage would win the most seats by far if an election was held today.
YouGov said Reform would jump from having just five MPs to 271, with Mr Farage poised to form a minority government.
Labour meanwhile would collapse from holding 403 seats now to just 178, with Sir Keir Starmer’s popularity having plummeted since the general election due to a series of disastrous policies and chaotic U-turns.
