*Number of Green Party Councillors up to 166
*Green Party win 87 seats in English local council elections, bringing their total number of councillors to 166
*Greens now sit on 58 councils across England
*Greens gain 7 seats on Bristol Council
*Greens win seats for the first time on Bournemouth, Bath, North East Somerset, Forest of Dean, Lewes, Mendip and Warwick councils
The Green Party achieved a strong result in Thursday's local elections, bringing their number of local councillors up to 166, a net gain of 4 councillors.
Bristol Council gained 7 Green councillors and York doubled its number of Green councillors (bringing the total number of Green councillors on York Council to 4).
The Green Party now has groups of Councillors on a number of councils across England, including Norwich City (14 councillors), Bristol City (13), Brighton and Hove (11), Lancaster (9), Solihull (9), Stroud District Council (7) and Oxford City (6).
The Green Party also achieved a record result in Thursday's General Election, winning 1,157,613 votes across the country. Caroline Lucas, who was elected the first Green MP in 2010, retained her Brighton Pavilion seat, increasing her vote share by 10.5% to give her a strong majority of 14.6% (1).
The party also achieved second place in four constituencies. Bristol West candidate Darren Hall received a historic upswing of 23%, taking the Greens' vote share in the constituency to 26.8% (2). The Greens also outpolled the Liberal Democrats in 135 seats. In 2010, they beat them in just one (3).
Notes:
(1) https://www.greenparty.org.uk/news/2015/05/08/greens-retain-brighton-pavilion-seat-and-win-over-one-million-votes/
(2) https://www.greenparty.org.uk/news/2015/05/08/darren-hall-achieves-23-upswing-in-green-vote-in-bristol-west/
(3) https://www.greenparty.org.uk/news/2015/05/09/greens-call-for-proportional-representation-after-winning-1,157,613-votes-and-just-one-seat/