Derbyshire Dales MP John Whitby will resign from Derby City Council “when the time is right for everybody”

Mr Whitby, who has been a Derby city councillor for Labour for a cumulative period of 10 years since 2010, including a term as its mayor, was elected Derbyshire Dales MP in July, supplanting Conservative Sarah Dines by 350 votes.

A month on since his election, Mr Whitby has faced calls to step down from his city council role to give more time to focus on his MP job and reduce his receipt of public money.

Mr Whitby, who represents the Mackworth and New Zealand city council ward, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “I am not planning on hanging around so I am having discussions with people. I want to do what is best for everybody. I don’t plan on hanging around for too long.

“When I was chosen as the Derbyshire Dales candidate I didn’t plan on hanging on to my city council seat but it was felt there needed to be a bit of a pause before stepping down.

“It needs to be right for the council. The problem is there is no other upcoming election to tie it to, there is no mayoral election, no police and crime commissioner election and no city council election because we are now all out.

“I am certainly not hanging on until 2027 (the next city council election).”

Mr Whitby has been a city councillor from 2010 until 2018 and from 2022 until now, most recently winning re-election as one of the three Mackworth and New Zealand members in 2023 with 1,190 votes, behind Conservative Guarav Pandey and ahead of fellow Labour councillor Ndukwe Onuoha.

Mr Whitby said: “There are a lot of MPs in the same position as me. It is quite a normal route to go down from councillor to MP and I know some people have stepped down and had by-elections already.

“It is my intent to not be on the council for much longer. My full attention has to be on the MP role and in reality I can’t do the council role justice alongside it. It is a real struggle, it is not easy at all.

“It is challenging just doing the MP role, there is so much to get my head around and so much communication to work through, and I need to recruit staff so we can get surgeries up and running and keep on top of casework, emails and invitations.

“I will speak to all interested parties and come to some sort of mutually beneficial arrangement.

“I could just go nuclear and go next week but I don’t feel that would be helpful.”

The full results of the Derbyshire Dales constituency election in July, one of the closest in the UK this year, were as follows:

John Whiby – Labour – 17,759

Sarah Dines – Conservative – 17,409

Edward Oakenfull – Reform UK – 7,728

Robert Court – Liberal Democrat – 4,860

Kelda Boothroyd – Green Party – 2,830

Rachel Elnaugh-Love – Independent – 369

Helen Wetherall – True & Fair Party – 317