Doncaster councillors pass symbolic 'no confidence' motion in Mayor Ros Jones
Reform UK councillors have accused the Mayor of misleading the public over the reopening of Doncaster Sheffield Airport - though this vote will not mean she loses her job
The Labour Mayor of Doncaster has lost a symbolic “no confidence” vote in the City of Doncaster Council chamber.
Council members passed the motion of no confidence in Mayor Ros Jones, filed by Reform UK leader Councillor Guy Aston, by 38 votes to 14.
Cllr Aston has repeatedly accused Jones of “misleading” the public regarding the expected return of commercial passenger flights to Doncaster Sheffield Airport.
He told the chamber: “The people of Doncaster were hoodwinked in May.
“This motion is about democracy. It’s not about the airport. It is about what people were given during the election. They were made promises and they would not kept.”
He said if voters had known the expected return date of passenger flights, the Reform UK candidate, Alexander Jones, would now be mayor.
The motion was slammed by the Labour Party as “political posturing” in the lead up to Thursday’s full council meeting.
It is purely symbolic and the motion acknowledged in writing that “it does not remove the mayor from office, alter the mayor’s statutory powers, or contravene the Local Government Act 2000”.
Mayor Jones echoed the party line in the council chamber and accused Aston of wasting council time.
She said: “Let me make this very simple for you, I’m not going anywhere!
“This motion is nothing more than a party-political performative waste of time. It holds no power and will not change a thing.
“I was voted in for an historic 4th term as the Directly Elected Mayor to serve all the residents of Doncaster. I therefore respect the democratic mandate I have been given.
Jones took aim at Cllr Aston, referring to previous comments to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
She said: “Guy, I took your words seriously when you said that you had no interest in ‘cheap stunts’ and wanted to be a serious party and not a ‘protest opposition’. This motion appears to prove otherwise.
“As a party are you serious about collaborating where we can in the interests of Doncaster? Or are you going to be nothing more than a party of protest for the next four years?
“If we are to have four years of messy political bun fighting and obstruction by the opposition then ultimately it will be the people of Doncaster who suffer, and I do not want that to happen.”
The motion stated Jones “misled” the public with her election pledge to reopen Doncaster Sheffield Airport (DSA) by Spring 2026, following the recent news passenger flights are unlikely to return until 2028.
Labour made the reopening of DSA the central pledge in her election campaign which saw her win a fourth consecutive term as Mayor of Doncaster.
As a result, the Reform motion read: “The Mayor’s repeated pledges on Doncaster Sheffield Airport have not been delivered and have misled the public as to the timescales and certainty of reopening.
“Confidence in the Mayor’s leadership has been undermined not only in respect of Doncaster Sheffield Airport but also more broadly, given the centrality of this issue to her campaign.”
Reform UK has 36 councillors on Doncaster Council, a significant majority over Labour’s 12 and the Conservatives six.
Additionally, independent councillor Mark Broadhurst was initially elected as a Reform UK councillor.
The vote has “formally recorded that the council has no confidence in the Mayor of Doncaster”.
After the motion was published, a Labour Party spokesperson told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “This is nothing more than political posturing from a group that is not serious about the future of Doncaster’s airport.
“Labour is taking the huge steps forward to reopen the airport. Reform wouldn’t commit to the airport’s future at the election and talk it down now for their own political gain.”