Lancaster University student steps down from city council prompting potential by-election

Katie Whearty represented the University and Scotforth Rural ward on Lancaster City Council and had latterly been an Independent.

She had supported student rent strikes and industrial action by university staff over the past year or two, and a campaign to save late-night buses running between a night club and the university campus.

With links to Liverpool, she has supported political campaigns there, such as a new education project highlighting public interest issues linked to the Hillsborough stadium disaster of 1989.

Katie was originally elected as a Labour representative but was later part of a group of Labour councillors who became Eco-Socialists in late 2020. Factors behind their move included unhappiness with the national Labour Party’s political direction under Keir Starmer after the Jeremy Corbyn and Momentum era.

This summer, the other Eco-Socialists joined the city council’s Green and Independent Group but Coun Whearty remained an Independent.

In the past two years or so, which included the pandemic lock-downs, cancelled lectures and other educational issues, Katie supported a range of Lancaster political activities. These included backing student rent strikes over unhappiness with university financial arrangements and supporting industrial action by staff from the University & College Union (UCU) amid concerns about enforced in-person teaching or pension issues .

Over the winter, she spoke at a solidarity rally outside Lancaster Town Hall in support of lecturers and support staff who had helped students through the pandemic.

She also supported saving the late-night Sugar Bus transport service for students run by Lancaster University Students Union from the Sugarhouse club in the city centre back to the campus.

However, she was unable to attend a number of formal Lancaster City Council meetings in recent times.

The University ward currently has two other councillors. They are Fabiha Askari and Oliver Robinson, both Labour.

Whole council elections are due next year but in the meantime the university vacancy may have to be filled. Requests are needed from two local electors for the city council to organise an election.