Warwickshire County Council leader George Finch has expressed confidence voters will stick with Reform UK in areas where councillors have defected to Restore Britain.

The Reform group, which leads at Shire Hall through a minority administration, has seen its seat count eroded by four defections to MP Rupert Lowe's new party since February.

Cllr Luke Cooper and Cllr Scott Cameron were critical of Cllr Finch's leadership in making the switch six months ago.

Cllr Dan Glover and Cllr Rob Aitkenhead then joined them in June with Glover confirming reports of "a lot of discontent" around top-down instructions from the national party when Cllr Finch faced a challenge to his leadership.

Cooper, Cameron and Glover all cited national issues and policy direction too.

It means Reform now hold just 17 out of 57 seats at Shire Hall, although they do benefit from having two Reform-supporting independents.

Restore may have similar policies but with four councillors could now sway tight votes due to the nip-and-tuck political balance of a council that is in no overall control and on borrowed time with local government reorganisation around the corner.

Speaking for the first time on the defections, Cllr Finch dismissed the prospect of Restore holding any balance of power and argued the ultimate judgement would come through elections to the new unitary councils in May 2027. Those unitaries will take over from Warwickshire's county, district and borough councils from April 2028.

"They are four disgruntled councillors," said Cllr Finch.

"I was disappointed for the residents who voted Reform, they deserve a Reform councillor. I don't know what they saw, maybe a glimpse of a better future.

"I don't believe that party has any future. If you look into what some of their spokespeople believe in, I find it awful."

The Local Democracy Reporting Service started putting some of Cllr Glover's frustrations to Cllr Finch with the leader interjecting to admit that Reform "could have done a lot better" in supporting its Rugby Borough Council election candidates in May 2026.

"I'm leader of the council but I don't have any charge over the local branches," he said.

Cllr Glover had also said in June that he "didn't sign up for this anti-democratic thing where we were keeping George regardless" – a reference to Reform UK's instruction not to put up an alternative leader of Warwickshire County Council in the event that Cllr Finch lost the vote of no confidence in March.

Put to him that defectors had felt Reform's Warwickshire group had been too centred around him, Cllr Finch replied: "I wouldn't say so.

"I think we have a good cabinet and a good group of councillors who are committed and loyal to the cause, to our message and to our mission as Reform.

"It is a shame they feel that message no longer speaks for them but it still does for the people. Let's wait for the shadow (unitary) elections, see if they keep their seats and whether they made the right decision."

Responding to Cllr Finch's comments, Cllr Cameron said: "We're not disgruntled. We just lost all faith in Reform in Warwickshire, predominantly because of the actions of the leader.

"Reform promised change but that has never been delivered. We feel like we were sold a pup.

"They preached democracy and then put us all on a three-line whip when we were voting in the chamber. We were elected to put residents first, not the party, and we will continue to do that under (group leader) Cllr Cooper.

"Nationally, we genuinely believe that Restore Britain and (leader) Rupert Lowe will deliver on the policies that we publish, not water them down or scrap them entirely."