A majority of one keeps any council administration on a knife edge, and the ruling group and its leader on their toes.
Nottinghamshire County Council leader Alan Rhodes found himself in this position when Labour regained power in May 2013. Mark Smulian reports
Labour had expected to win slightly bigger, and found itself having to both grapple with deep spending cuts and implement its election pledges with no slack in the council numbers.
"I don't recommend running an administration with a majority of one, its very challenging especially when you have a deficit of £130m that loss of government grant has worsened to £154m," Alan says.
One plus point has been group discipline where "people know they cannot be absent, or late, or go home early. It's a very tight group, and that needs a very good chief whip", he says.
Last year, Labour had decided to diversify its group and chose a number of candidates who were female and/or aged under 30.
"We had some all women shortlists since the Labour party aims to involve women and young people more at all levels," Alan says.
"There are now 14 women in a group of 34, against four out of 16 before and they are in important roles and younger councillors.
"I think the average age of a Nottinghamshire councillor has fallen by 10 years since the election."
Alan joined Labour in 1978 after having been a trade union workplace representative.
He was elected to Bassetlaw District Council in 1986, and remains on that authority.
In 2005 he was elected to Nottinghamshire for the Worksop North East and Carlton division and became Labour leader after the party lost in 2009.
Labour inherited from the Conservatives a revived committee system, which it has retained though Alan has some misgivings.
"I've worked under both systems and personally prefer the cabinet as more efficient, but I agree that the committee system gives backbenchers far more input into decisions than they had before," he says.
"On the other hand it does tie them up in meetings when they previously had the chance to be out in their localities, so its not clear cut.
"The committee system came in for four years, so we have the chance to change it during this administration's term. I'm not sure we will, though I'm told there could be savings."
Savings are a sore point in Nottinghamshire. It faces cuts like anywhere, but feels it has had a worse settlement than have more affluent areas and is running a 'fair deal' campaign to try to rectify this.
"I don't think Eric Pickles and I are on each other's Christmas card lists," Alan observes.
Meanwhile, his administration is implementing the living wage for 2,500 affected staff from 1 April, which he cites as "a good thing to do, and it helps with staff retention and morale".
There will also be a programme of building 'extra care' centres for older people that will match their needs and degree of independence and capability.
One popular election pledge, Alan says, was 20mph speed zones outside all schools.
Streetlights are being turned back on where requested by residents or parish councils though some are being dimmed on non-residential roads.
Nottinghamshire is two-tier area with a unitary city in its centre. The councils are collaborating in various ways to make savings, but nothing more radical is yet expected.
"I don't think the unitary debate is over, but it has gone very quiet since the Coalition came in and received no encouragement," Alan says.
"I think a lot of people will want to wait until after 2015 and see what shape local government has after that."
The precarious majority leaves the administration open to absences, defections and by-election losses.
But Alan concludes: "With a majority of one the mutual support shown by my members, a sense of purpose and a determination to take the responsible but difficult decisions will put the county council back on a secure financial footing."
Discipline is the key
C'llr – February 2014