In a sensational victory, Derbyshire Conservatives have taken control of the County Council after four years of mismanagement by the ruling Labour group.

The Conservatives went into yesterday's local elections needing to win an additional 15 seats in order to gain a majority and take control of the authority, but ended up taking 19 seats and will now benefit from a healthy working majority of 10. They picked up seats in a wide range of areas including Dronfield, Chesterfield, Heanor, Ripley, Ilkeston and Buxton.

In contrast, Labour lost 19 seats in total, including two former Cabinet Members, who are now no longer even Councillors.

Commenting, the new Leader of Derbyshire County Council, Cllr Barry Lewis said: "We didn’t expect this but we put in a really good campaign - delivering thousands of leaflets to thousands of people.

"Knocking on doors in the last few months we started getting a feeling that things were turning in our favour.

"I'm delighted to say that we're already hard at work on delivering our manifesto commitments and as of today, we have immediately scrapped Labour's controversial and unnecessary tip charges."

Pictured: Cllr Barry Lewis celebrating with colleagues at County Hall following the Conservative election victory.