CONSERVATIVES have won every seat but one in Hambleton – with Ukip taking the only seat the Tories failed to win on the district council.

This is the first election for the local authority since it agreed a drastic boundary reorganisation in order to cut costs.

Hambleton District Council has shed 16 of its elected representatives, as it reduces its number of wards and councillors from 44 to 28.

Those seats that were up for grabs were won overwhelmingly by the Tories, who took 27 out of 28 seats – 93 per cent of the total.

The one seat that was won by another party went to Ukip candidate Claire Palmer, of the Northallerton South Ward, who with 762 votes beat Conservative Huw Jones by just four votes.

Mark Robson, who was re-elected as Tory councillor for the Sowerby and Topcliffe ward, also looks set to remain as leader of the district council, a decision that will be ratified at the next full council meeting at the end of the month.

He said: “We’ve reduced the size of the council to 28 members, which is a significant reduction. Apart from the seat won by Ukip, the Conservatives would have 100 per cent of those seats.”

It was a scene replicated across North Yorkshire, as Ryedale and Richmondshire districts also now have a Conservative majority, albeit with a lesser percentage of Conservatives than Hambleton.

Some high profile Liberal Democrat candidates have been lost from the council, including Stokesley’s Bryn Griffith. The two ward councillors for Stokesley are Conservative Andy Wake, who was re-elected, and Stephen Dickins, a new face to the council.

Another startling figure was the high voting turnout; with 72 per cent of residents of Hambleton voting in the election, which could be the highest turnout in recent history.

Cllr Robson said: “I’ve sat on parish and district councils for 20 years, but it’s the largest turnout of the public I’ve seen in all that time.

“People were queuing in Sowerby before the polling stations opened and it was still busy at the end of the day.

“I also noticed throughout the day yesterday it was probably the largest amount of young voters I’ve ever seen, which is good for democracy and even better for me that they elected Conservative councillors.”