COUNCILLOR Doina Cornell has been elected as the new Labour leader for Stroud District Council.
Cllr Cornell will take over from Cllr Steve Lydon, who has stepped down after just over 18 months service as both the leader of SDC Labour party councillors and the council leader.
Stroud district labour group elected Cllr Cornell, who represents Dursley on the council, during a group meeting last night.
Cllr Doina Cornell replaces Steve Lydon as labour leader for SDC
Speaking to the SNJ this morning Cllr Cornell said that she was ‘honoured’ to have been chosen: “I’m really honoured to have been elected, and I am really looking forward to continuing to work with partners, the co-operative alliance and all members of the local Labour Party to protect local services and invest in the local community,” she said.
Paying tribute to the hard work of previous leader Cllr Steve Lydon, Cllr Cornell said: “Steve has been a fantastic role model to me over the last two years, hardworking, honest and principled.
“Despite tough challenges caused by funding cuts to local authorities, as a result of his leadership SDC is considered to be a high-performing council.”
Cllr Lydon, who will continue to serve as councillor for The Stanleys on the district council said in his weekly column for the SNJ that he had decided to stand down from his leadership roles after an illness before Christmas as ‘health and family must come first’.
Cllr Lydon, who has stepped down to focus on his health and family, will still represent The Stanleys on Stroud District Council
Today he added that it had been a ‘difficult’ decision to make: “Although I had always planned to stand down in 2020 to allow younger people to take up the roles within the party, it was a difficult decision to take in light of the work that I still wanted to do.
“The financial challenges that local councils face aren’t going to go away and I’m still very concerned about the lack of desperately needed affordable housing in the area,” he continued.
The Labour group will elect a group deputy leader in due course.
Members of Stroud District Council will elect a new chairperson for the strategy and resources committee when they meet on January 25, the chair will automatically replace Cllr Lydon as leader of Stroud District Council.
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