Labour's Andy Abrahams re-elected as Mansfield's executive mayor

Mr Abrahams polled 9,987 votes to comfortably take first place for Labour ahead of Conservative candidate Coun Andre Camilleri with 5,832, while a disappointed Mick Barton, who was expected to be Mr Abrahams’s closest challenger, third for the Mansfield Independents with 4,992 votes.

Independent Julie Tasker was fourth with 936 votes and Karen Seymour, for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, came fifth with 420.

Thanking his team and the Mansfield public for their support, Mr Abrahams saying he felt “very, very humbled” after boosting his majority, having won by just two votes four years ago, from the previous mayor, Kate Allsop.

He said: “I promised we will work hard to achieve and improve the lives of everyone across the Mansfield district.

“We hope this will be the foundation for the elections next year because what we want is Labour in power.

“I’m proud of our conduct in this election, I don’t think we’ve ever resorted to what I call this ‘Facebook slandering’ and again I want to thank the public for seeing through all that and returning Labour with a massive majority.

“I promise my team will be committed to improving the lives of every Mansfield resident and we have already started work on getting us back on that road to recovery.

“I know there are still very challenging times ahead out there, notably the cost of living crisis and the consequences of the disastrous financial policies of this Government.

“We will not let you down, thank you for your support.”

Mr Abrahams also used his speech to pay tribute to former councillor Brian Lohan, who died on Christmas Eve last year.

"He said: “Cheers and thanks to Brian, we’re thinking of you today.”

Beaten Coun Camilieri, Nottinghamshire Council member for Mansfield South, said he was disappointed to lose, but vowed to work with Mr Abrahams to get the best results for Mansfield.

He said: “I’m disappointed of course, I wanted to be the mayor, I actually wanted to scrap the mayoral role, but moving forward, I’m going to work with him and try to get all the opposition to work together to keep him to his promises.

“We’ve got a lot to do in Mansfield and we’ve got a lot of money to spend and we want to make sure he spends it wisely.

“But I congratulate him, it’s been a reasonably clean campaign and I’m pleased we actually got ahead of the Independents and finished second, and I did that because I’m a hard worker, that’s what I do and what I’ll continue to do.”

Mick Barton, the Mansfield Independents candidate coud not hide his disappointment at the result.

He said: “I’ve worked my socks off for this, but that’s democracy.

“I fought a clean campaign which can’t be said for the other main parties, but that’s between me and them.

"I really believed I would win this election and there are people out there who will have listened to the Conservative pledge to get rid of the mayor when I believe they’ve no intention of doing that.

"People will see all this pan out with both in years to come.”

Mansfield mayoral election result:

ELECTED – Andy Abrahams, Labour: 9,987 votes;

Andre Camilleri, Conservative: 5,832;

Mick Barton, Mansfield Independents, 4,992;

Julie Tasker, Independent, 936;

Karen Seymour, TUSC: 420.