Conservatives at Pendle Council have accused the ruling Independent and Lib-Dems groups of trying to manipulate how committee places are allocated for political advantage.

Accusations came at Pendle Council’s latest full meeting following the local elections, when the political balance of committees was reviewed.

Committees have influence, powers and responsibilities on matters such as planning applications, council finances, taxi licensing; takeaways and pub licensing, and complaints against individual councillors.

Pendle Council now has 13 Conservatives, 10 Independents, eight Lib-Dems and two Pendle True Independents. All the independents are ex-Labour councillors who left Labour over disagreements.

However, Yasser Iqbal and Naeem Ashraf have formed a smaller group, the Pendle True Independents (PTIs).

Although the Independents and Lib-Dems are in joint political control, the Conservatives are the largest single political group. This means they are entitled to numerous committee places. A council officer’s report suggested changes to seat allocations on committees. Councillors debated these and offered alternatives.

The report said Pendle True Independents currently had have three less seats than their overall entitlement, the Conservatives had one more and the Independents two more. However, Conservative and Independents had a stronger case to have their numbers rounded-up on committees.

Conservative Martyn Stone said: “I think we are all in favour of fairness. It would be fairer to reduce Independents on the Development Management Committee.”

But his idea was lost in a vote.

Independent Coun Mohammed Iqbal said: “If we’re giving one seat to the PTIs on development, the other PTI councillor will feel left out. Can they suggest which committee they would like to be on?”

PTI Coun Naeem Ashraf suggested taxi licensing.

Then Lib-Dem Coun David Whipp, the deputy council leader, suggested expanding the taxi committee by one councillor to eight.

However, Conservative Nadeem Ahmed objected. He said: “You cannot have councillors changing the council like this. If they are so interested in including the PTIs, these proposals could have been put on paper before this meeting. I want to see this properly calculated by officers and circulated beforehand. We cannot have gerrymandering like this.”

He then turned to the new mayor, asking: “Please use your power to rule this out of order. We’ve never had anything like this before.”

Coun Whipp said he had intended to bring written ideas to the meeting.

Conservative Neil Butterworth warned against increasing the number of Taxi Licensing Committee councillors to an even number.

He said: “If you get a split 4-4 decision , where will you be? We need an odd number of councillors. We don’t need doubt or confusion on the taxi committee. It’s a nightmare. If people saw what we saw, there would be uproar. Don’t put it in jeopardy.”

The council’s legal officer, Howard Culshaw, said: “My advice is that it would be out of order to be done at this meeting. It needs a notice period and could come to the next meeting. I’d be uncomfortable if this was done at this meeting.”

But Lib-Dem Coun Tom Whipp said: “We have changed committees at other meetings. These would still be within the political balance.”

Conservative Kieran McGladdery said: “The advice is clear that it should be ruled out of order. That’s sound advice. Please, let’s move on.”

Fellow Conservative Martyn Stone said: “There seem to be cheap gerrymandering attempts which are blatantly trying to disadvantage one group. We should heed Mr Culshaw’s advice. The public is watching this.”

The new Mayor, Coun Mohammad Aslam, said: “We will accept Mr Culshaw’s advice and bring it to the next meeting.”