Social media conflict damaging Lancashire County Council's wider reputation
One councillor at Lancashire County Council is under investigation over allegations of harassment via social media
Hello and welcome to The Lancashire Lead.
We’ve covered social media conflict at Lancashire County Council in some depth on these pages before - so it was no surprise to see the topic arise when the Local Government Association publish its peer review into the authority.
The report, which is not designed to criticise, highlighted that numerous councillors and staff had raised concerns over the culture at County Hall. Complaints have more than tripled in 2025 compared to previous years.
The authority stresses that there has been no increase in serious breaches of the code of conduct - but the bar for any authority to take action against a councillor over their use of social media is extremely high.
Lancashire briefing
🗳️ Reform UK and the Green Party’s rise; city centre shops and jobs; night-time safety and students active in politics are among the big issues for people in Lancaster as a council by-election approaches. The Castle ward is set for a poll next week following the resignation of Green city councillor Isabella Metcalfe-Riener, who was also a Lancaster University student. She was elected two years ago but is moving away. Currently, the ward’s two other city councillors are both Greens. The Labour Party recently claimed residents ‘deserve a full-time councillor’. But the Greens said Isabella made a valuable contribution including representing young people. University students and staff have been elected as city councillors over the years for different parties, building a tradition of university representation at the council. The Greens, Labour, Lib Dems and Reform UK are all standing on Thursday, May 21 for the one vacant seat – but the Conservatives are sitting it out.
🤝🏻 Conservatives and defectors to Reform UK have been accused of forming an unannounced ‘Conform’ coalition at Ribble Valley Borough Council. Two councillors who recently defected to Reform have kept their influential committee roles despite swapping parties – which indicates a coalition, opposition parties claim. But Reform councillors have rejected the suggestion. The accusations came at Ribble Valley Borough Council’s annual meeting, when influential committee chairperson roles for the next 12 months were decided. No local elections were held in the Ribble Valley last week, unlike other parts of Lancashire where Reform had big wins. But in recent weeks, three Ribble Valley councillors have defected to Reform, creating an official new group of four. The borough is still officially led by the Conservatives, under council leader Simon Hore. At the meeting, he recommended that Ian Brown, formerly a Conservative and then an independent before joining Reform; and Ricky Newmark, also formerly a Conservative but now in Reform, should be the chairmen of licensing and economic committees respectively. Both held the roles previously.
🌹 Matthew Brown is set to remain the leader of Preston City Council after the Labour group on the authority backed him to stay in the post. The veteran politician was re-elected unopposed as local party leader during a meeting of Labour councillors on Tuesday evening. The Labour group decision came after last week’s local election results in which the party lost overall control of the city council for the first time in 15 years. However, deputy council leader Martyn Rawlinson has not put himself forward to remain in that role, which he first took up five years ago. He is, however, intending to stay as the cabinet member for resources. Cllr Valerie Wise – currently the cabinet member for community wealth building – hopes to replace him. She first sat on the city council back in the 1990s and was the authority’s leader between May 1994 and December 1995. She returned to the town hall after a more than 20-year absence in 2022.
Social media conflict damaging Lancashire County Council’s wider reputation
By Luke Beardsworth
Lancashire County Council must address the social media conflict which is damaging the authority’s wider reputation.
That is one key verdict from the Local Government Association’s Corporate Peer Challenge which has been published ahead of Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting.
It highlights that complaints against councillors have more than tripled from typically less than 20 to 61 in 2025 - with the majority coming since Reform UK took power in May 2025.
And that comes as The Lancashire Lead can reveal that at least one Reform UK councillor is being investigated by Lancashire Constabulary over allegations of harassment centred around social media use.
This investigation is ongoing under the Operation Ford banner, which is designed to protect elected officials from intimidation, harassment and violence.
The concerns are a blackspot and altogether avoidably risk distracting from what is broadly a positive report into how Lancashire County Council is performing.
It says that the council’s priorities are clear, that the council is working positively with district councils and that there is a clear focus on embedding ‘value for money’ into decision making.
But some councillors privately believe that the report does not accurately reflect the mood at County Hall.
