Labour Retains Control of Hounslow By Just One Seat
Conservative, Reform and the Greens all make significant gains
The new ward map of Hounslow is more complicated than it used to be. Picture: Hounslow Council
May 9, 2026
Labour has retained control of Hounslow Council following local elections held on Thursday 7 May, but with a significantly reduced majority and a transformed opposition that signals a more fragmented political landscape for the west London borough.
The party won 32 of the council's 62 seats — enough to govern but well down from the 52 seats it held after the 2022 elections. The Conservatives made a strong recovery with 17 seats, Reform UK broke through with 8, the Green Party won 3, the Liberal Democrats returned with 1, and former Labour councillor Theo Dennison held his seat as an independent.
Turnout across the borough was 41%, higher than the 33.4% recorded in 2022.
The most dramatic story of the night was the arrival of Reform UK as a genuine force in Hounslow politics. The party, which had just one councillor going into the election following a defection, won eight seats across five wards — including a clean sweep of both seats in Hanworth Park and a notable breakthrough in Feltham West, where Tony Brown became the borough's first Reform candidate to win at a general local election, polling 1,339 votes.
Reform also took two seats in Bedfont, one in Feltham North, and one in Hanworth Village, establishing a foothold in the western parts of the borough that had previously been safely Labour territory.
The Conservatives consolidated their dominance in the affluent Chiswick wards, winning all three seats in both Chiswick Gunnersbury and Chiswick Homefields. Key figures including Joanna Biddolph and Jack Emsley were re-elected comfortably. However, the group’s leader Peter Thompson finished fourth in Chiswick Riverside ward and lost his seat. Cllr Thompson led the council between 2006 and 2010, and had been a councillor for over 20 years.
But the party also made gains elsewhere. In Cranford they won two of the three seats, splitting the ward with Labour. Heston West — a ward Labour might have hoped to hold — returned one Conservative alongside two Labour councillors on of which was the Labour Leader Shantanu Rajawat who secured his seat by just 87 votes. In 2022, Cllr Rajawat was almost 1,300 clear of his nearest challenger. The Conservatives also ousted Farhaan Rehman in Hounslow Heath. He had hit the headlines before the election after he was caught parking a Lamborghini in a disabled bay.
Heston Central also returned three Conservative councillors, reinforcing the party's reach into the heart of the borough.
| Hounslow Borough Results by Ward | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ward | Lab | Con | Ref | Grn | LD | Ind | Seats |
| Bedfont | 1 |
- | 2 |
- | - | - | 3 |
| Brentford East | 2 |
- | - | - | - | - | 2 |
| Brentford West | 1 |
- | - | 1 |
- | - | 2 |
| Chiswick Gunnersbury | - | 3 |
- | - | - | - | 3 |
| Chiswick Homefields | - | 3 |
- | - | - | - | 3 |
| Chiswick Riverside | 1 |
1 |
- | 1 |
- | - | 3 |
| Cranford | 1 |
2 |
- | -- | - | - | 3 |
| Feltham North | 1 |
- | 2 |
- | - | - | 3 |
| Feltham West | 2 |
- | 1 |
- | - | - | 3 |
| Hanworth Park | - | - | 2 |
- | - | - | 2 |
| Hanworth Village | 2 |
- | 1 |
- | - | 3 |
|
| Heston Central | - | 3 |
- | - | - | - | 3 |
| Heston East | 2 |
- | - | 1 |
- | - | 3 |
| Heston West | 2 |
1 |
- | - | - | - | 3 |
| Hounslow Central | 3 |
- | - | - | - | - | 3 |
| Hounslow East | 2 |
- | - | - | - | - | 2 |
| Hounslow Heath | 2 |
1 |
- | - | - | - | 3 |
| Hounslow South | 3 |
- | - | - | - | - | 3 |
| Hounslow West | - | 3 |
- | - | - | - | 3 |
| Isleworth | 2 |
- | - | - | 1 |
- | 3 |
| Osterley & Spring Grove | 2 |
- | - | - | - | - | 2 |
| Syon & Brentford Lock | 2 |
- | - | - | - | 1 |
3 |
| Total | 32 |
17 |
8 |
3 |
1 |
1 |
62 |
The Green Party had its best ever night in Hounslow, winning three seats across three different wards. The headline result was in Brentford West, where Guy Lambert — who had defected from Labour to the Greens in late 2025 — topped the poll with 1,078 votes and was elected alongside Labour's Craig Owen. Cllr Lambert's result was one of the highest individual vote totals of the night.
The Greens also won in Chiswick Riverside, where Rick Rowe was elected alongside Conservative Gabriella Giles and Labour's Amy Croft. And in Heston East, Jasmine Deol was elected for the Greens — a ward that Labour had expected to hold entirely.
Despite the losses, Labour performed solidly in many of its core wards. The party swept all three seats in Hounslow Central, Hounslow South, Hounslow East, and Heston East — and held two seats in Osterley & Spring Grove. In Isleworth the party won two of three seats, with the third going to Liberal Democrat Roger Crouch, who returns the party to the council for the first time in years.
In Syon & Brentford Lock, Labour's Katherine Dunne and Dan Bowring were elected alongside independent Theo Dennison, who successfully defended the seat he won in a March 2025 by-election.
Returning Officer and Chief Executive Mandy Skinner said she was pleased the election had run smoothly and looked forward to working with both returning and newly elected members.
The results leave Labour in a more precarious position than at any point in recent memory on Hounslow Council. With Reform establishing a base in the west, the Conservatives strengthening in the east and centre, and the Greens winning their first seats in the borough, future elections look set to be more fiercely contested than the near-clean sweeps Labour enjoyed a decade ago. Just one defection would leave the party dependent on support from another party to maintain control of the borough.
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