Editor’s Pick of the Week: Burying bad news at Kex Gill and election diarrhoea in Harrogate

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Election counts are like constipation followed by diarrhoea: nothing happens for ages and then everything happens at once.

After sitting through the count for the first-ever Harrogate Town Council election yesterday (May 2), the rapid-fire declaration of results began with independent Paul Haslam taking Old Bilton and Reform UK’s David Goodall winning in nearby Bilton Woodfield.

But the early unpredictability soon ended as the Liberal Democrats won 15 of the remaining 17 seats to inflict one of the most crushing defeats on the Conservatives ever seen locally.

You can see the full results here, read reaction here and recap my live blog from the day here. Look for an interview with Councillor Chris Aldred, the chair of Harrogate and Knaresborough Liberal Democrats tomorrow, on what the town council might now do, and what it might cost council taxpayers.

Yesterday’s excitement didn’t end there. At 5.15pm an email pinged in from North Yorkshire Council saying it planned to spend another £11.7 million on the A59 road realignment at Kex Gill, between Harrogate and Skipton. To put that in context, £11.7 million is also as much as the entire cost of the Harrogate Station Gateway project.

The timing of the news, after a draining day of election drama and a sunny three-day bank holiday weekend looming, immediately brought to mind the phrase ‘a good day to bury bad news’.

The Stray Ferret got wind, to extend the toiletry metaphor, a few weeks ago that the cost of the £68.8 million scheme was likely to rise. The need to remove 16,000 tonnes of poor quality soil, which we also exclusively revealed in January, appears to be a factor. It’s not only the road suffering slippage.

Finally, some balm to look forward to next week. William Dutton’s ambitious plans to create a professional chamber orchestra based at the Royal Hall playing the quality of concerts you’d expect to find in Birmingham, London and Manchester is, in his words, either extremely brave or foolish.

 It would be a huge boost to Harrogate’s arts and culture scene if it succeeds, and I intend to be there at Thursday’s (May 8) opening concert. The all-English first half seems a great way to round-off the 80th anniversary of VE Day.