The fragile peace in Powys Council's independent members has been dashed already after the group split.

It emerged after the council’s annual meeting on Thursday, May 26 that the Independent group has now split into two camps.

Before the council meeting the one big group of 16 Independent councillors had elected two leaders, Cllrs Heulwen Hulme, a former cabinet member in the ruling Independent group on the council, and Jeremy Pugh, one of several councillors who left the group between 2017 and 2022 and formed Action for Powys.

Cllr Hulme is now leader of the Independent group which has six other members – Graham Breeze, Peter James, Arwel Jones, Gareth D Jones, Edwin Roderick and Mike Williams.

Mr Pugh is now leading the Independents for Powys group which has five other members – Ange Williams, Claire Mills, Bryan Davies, Ed Jones and Gareth E Jones.

Cllr Hulme said: “The decision was made at a meeting we had on May 20.

“The returning members of the original Independent group felt that the views of what was Action for Powys were very different and it didn’t suit to work with them.”

Cllr Pugh said: “We wanted to stay as one group and were keen to work together but the others wanted to pull away.

“They went off and called themselves the Independent Group and we were left with no choice but form another group.”

Cllr Pugh why “Action for Powys” was not being used for the new alliance, adding: “New members stood as independents.

“It was felt important that independent should be reflected in the name of the group and I’m happy with that as it’s all about the end result.”

The changes also mean that there are six non-affiliated councillors including four that were elected as independents.

They are: Cllr Beverley Baynham, Deb Edwards, Joy Jones and Geoff Morgan.

Little Brighouse – who was elected as a Liberal Democrat but is suspended from the party pending an investigation into an alleged antisemitic social media post – and the Green Party’s Jeremy Thorp are the other non-affiliated independent members.

Due to boundary changes Powys now has 68 councillors.

The make-up of the rest of the council is:

  • Liberal Democrats – 23
  • Conservative – 14
  • Labour – 9
  • Plaid Cymru – 3