The Conservatives secured two council seats in by-elections held in Essex on Thursday, dealing a blow to the Reform Party just weeks after losing ground.
Danielle Belton, a former leader of Rochford District Council, won more than half the votes cast in the Sweyne Park and Grange ward. She lost her previous seat on May 7 but will now return as an opposition councillor to the Reform-led administration.
Her husband, Stuart Belton, triumphed in the Rayleigh West seat on Essex County Council, pushing Reform into third place behind the Liberal Democrats.
"I was not predicting that kind of victory," Belton told the BBC. "It sends a message. This area is not prepared to be used as a stepping stone for opportunist Reform members."
Belton's earlier defeat in May to Reform by just 26 votes was reversed with a 56% share and 37% turnout—unusually high for a by-election.
The losses do not alter the balance of power: Reform retains a majority on Essex County Council with 52 members, and holds the largest bloc on Rochford District Council (12 of 39 seats), likely allowing them to continue as a minority administration.
Belton said she is "quite comfortable sitting in opposition and scrutinising the decisions they are going to try and make."
The by-elections were triggered after Stuart Prior was expelled from Reform over allegations of racist and Islamophobic social media posts. Prior, who denied being racist, had won a seat in the local elections before his expulsion.
Peter Harris, Reform's leader on the county council, acknowledged the selection was a mistake. "It looks like it, doesn't it? I don't know the detail. But yes, extremely disappointing," he said.
Fifteen miles away, the Liberal Democrats held the Springfield seat on Essex County Council, with Richard Lee succeeding long-serving councillor Mike Mackrory, who died suddenly in April.