The newly-appointed leader of the largest political party on Dumfries and Galloway Council is openly looking to strike a power-sharing deal with opposition councillors.
At a meeting on Monday night, Annandale North Councillor Gail Macgregor was selected to replace Annandale South member Ian Carruthers as head of the local Conservatives group.
Shortly afterwards, Gail put her cards on the table by posting on Twitter: “Humbled to have been elected leader of Dumfries and Galloway Council Conservative group tonight.
“Looking forward to constructive discussions with other groups/independents to form a minority Scottish Conservatives administration.”
The following day, Gail said: “It’s very early days as other groups are putting together their leadership teams. So, we haven’t entered into any formal negotiations at the moment.
“There are difficulties nationally with some parties working with others, but my priority is to speak to everybody on the council and try to find a very constructive way of forming a functioning council which takes forward the priorities which the communities that elected us want.
“It’s about sitting down at the table and ruling nothing out.”
The Conservatives are the largest party in the region, having secured 16 seats. The SNP gained 11 seats, Labour returned nine, there were six independents, and one Lib Dems councillor was re-elected.
Councillor Macgregor, who has been a councillor since 2007, was re-elected to serve the Annandale North ward after gaining 1,153 votes.
Despite a Labour-SNP joint administration in the previous term, Conservative councillor Gail was appointed to serve as the council’s spokesperson at COSLA (the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities).
Meanwhile, her fellow Annandale North ward councillor Stephen Thompson has been appointed as leader of the SNP group.
Councillor Thompson said on Tuesday that no discussions had yet taken place with opposition parties about forming an administration.
He said: “I try to be as open as possible in not ruling anything out. The bookies might not put odds on us forming a relationship with the Conservative group for example, but you have to never rule out anything entirely just incase.”
The Labour group has yet to appoint its leader, but this is expected later in the week.
Two thirds of the Labour group are fresh faces, while councillors Archie Dryburgh, Sean Marshall, and Davie Stitt were re-elected for another term.
Annandale East and Eskdale Councillor Archie Dryburgh said: “We’ll be having a meeting later this week when we can get everyone together because some of the newly-elected members have been working.”
Negotiations will be taking place between political groups over the coming days about the potential for forming a joint administration.
The coalitions that formed following the previous elections were: 2017 – Labour-SNP, 2012 – Conservative-SNP, 2007 – Conservative-Lib Dems.
