North East mayor will make waves

It wasn't as dramatic as the count in the West Midlands, where the Labour candidate defeated Conservative incumbent mayor Andy Street by a mere 0.3 percentage points in what was arguably the biggest shock for the Tories in this month's local elections. Nor was the result as unexpected as in York and North Yorkshire, where Labour's David Skaith won with 66,761 votes, compared with Conservative candidate Keane Duncan's 51,967 - in a region that contains prime minister Rishi Sunak's own Richmond constituency. And yet, the election of Kim McGuinness as the North East's first metro mayor is still fascinating. Labour refused to allow its North of Tyne mayor Jamie Driscoll to run as its candidate for the vastly enlarged region, for internal political reasons. When Driscoll decided to run as an independent, it set up the potential for a split in the progressive vote, prompting fears of a repeat of Ken Livingstone's 2000 victory as London mayor, which he sealed as an independent candidate after being blocked from running for Labour.