Westminster City Council leader Sir Simon Milton will be confirmed this week as the next chairman of the Conservative-led Local Government Association following a ballot of council leaders.
Sir Simon, already a high profile town hall politician, stood against two other candidates, Gordon Keymer, leader of Tandridge DC, and Ken Thornber, leader of Hampshire CC and won a resounding 66% of the votes.
The announcement of the new chairman will take place tomorrow at the LGA's annual conference in Birmingham. Sir Simon, who is elected for three years, takes over from Lord (Sandy) Bruce-Lockhart who has been chair for the past three years and was the association's first Conservative to hold the post, reflecting the party's majority in local government.
In an interview to appear in The MJ later this week Sir Simon said local government was 'at a tipping point' as regards devolution and 'I want to give it a final push.' But he admitted the autumn spending round could be problematic.
