THE Green Party says it has exceeded expectations after it went from one seat to six to become the main opposition on Braintree Council.

The party won in Silver End and Cressing, Witham North and Kelvedon and Feering and victory for its Independent partners in Coggeshall takes the new alliance to a total of eight seats.

Nick Unsworth and Tom Walsh both received more than 1,000 votes each to snatch the ward from the Conservatives and bring an end to Lynette Bowers-Flint’s eight years as a councillor.

The previous main opposition party, Labour, saw its stake on the council cut from four seats to two.

Green leader James Abbott said: “We are very pleased. I think we can comfortably say we have exceeded our expectations and will be looking to form a group of Greens and Independents which fits with the cooperation agreement we had before.

“It’s a huge amount of work put in by lots of people, we’ve been campaigning for months.

“I think our success is down to a combination of factors. On the doorstep, clearly people weren’t happy with both the Conservatives and Labour. And because we have been working in the area a long time I think people saw us as a viable alternative.

“There are other local issues like the local plan, waste incinerator, there’s the arguments we’re making that the Conservatives are letting all these houses be built without the services. It was a combination of things.

“We thought maybe we would get four or five with the Independents but to get eight is just a terrific result and we are really pleased.

“We look forward to the new session of council and doing what we said which was to challenge the Conservatives because to be honest I don’t think they have been in the last few years."

Independent Nick Unsworth said he thought a campaign leaflet sent out by Conservative representatives in Coggeshall attacking the Independent candidates over 'a tax bombshell' had harmed Tory chances of retaining their seats in the ward.

Mr Unsworth said: "We're absolutely delighted and we're really grateful to all those who voted for us.

"The turnout in Coggeshall was over 43 per cent which, when compared with the rest of the district, shows that people were particularly unhappy with what's been going on.

"Some people did talk to us about Brexit on the doorstep but this election was about local matters such as the waste incinerator and housing and we're looking forward to beginning the hard work to represent the views of people in Coggeshall on those matters.

"Part of the agreement with the Greens is that there's no party whip so we'll be able to fully represent people without any party politics.

"I don't think the leaflet the Conservatives sent out earlier this week did them any favours - it was completely inaccurate and the amount of spelling mistakes in there shows that maybe closing the libraries isn't such a good idea after all."