Wolverhampton City Council

Celebrating the achievements of Wolverhampton women will be one of the city’s new civic leader’s themes for the coming year.

City of Wolverhampton Council

Councillor Claire Darke, who has served the Park ward since 2008, was officially sworn in as the 61st Mayor of Wolverhampton at a ceremony held at the Civic Centre on Wednesday.

“I am the 61st Mayor of Wolverhampton but only the 10th woman mayor so to reflect this, one of my themes of the year is celebrating women’s contribution to the city,” she said.

Wolverhampton has seen the biggest cuts to youth services in the country over the last three years.

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The 91% drop in spending is being linked to a rise in knife crime by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Knife Crime - which analysed data from local councils.

City of Wolverhampton Council said that it has invested in the OnSide Youth Zone, which has also attracted private and grant support, in place of council run youth centres.

"Many more young people use the services at the youth zone than ever used youth centres so there is an arguably better provision for less public funding," it said.

Here are some of the election stories making the headlines on the Birmingham Live website today:

• Bruising night for Labour in the West Midlands
• Conservatives gain ground despite Brexit backlash
• Sandwell Council leader to resign after party sweeps board in local elections

Here's how the Express & Star is reporting the local election results so far:

• Tories make gains as vote collapse fails to materialise
• Major parties suffer in local elections as voters vent Brexit frustration
• Wolverhampton local election results: Labour in control but Tories gain one seat

For those of you waking up, this is how the overnight election results have panned out in the West Midlands.

LDRS

One of the big results saw the Conservative Party seize overall control of Walsall Council, taking two seats off Labour.

However, the party couldn't make enough gains to take Dudley Borough Council as it tied with Labour for the number of seats, although, with a Tory mayor, it has a casting vote when it comes to deciding later this month who'll lead the authority.

Elsewhere, the Tories lost their majority in Worcester but held on to North Warwickshire, Rugby and Tamworth.

Labour, meanwhile, held on to Coventry, Sandwell, Telford and Wrekin and Wolverhampton.

We're still waiting for the final result from Stoke-on-Trent.

Let's recap on the results we've had so far tonight.

• Coventry City Council - Labour hold
• North Warwickshire Borough Council - Conservative hold
• Rugby Borough Council - Conservative hold
• Sandwell Borough Council - Labour hold
• Tamworth Borough Council - Conservative hold
• Walsall Borough Council - Conservative gains overall control
• Wolverhampton City Council - Labour hold
• Worcester City Council - Conservatives lose overal control

There are still three to come from Dudley, Telford and Wrekin and Stoke-on-Trent.