A FORMER county council leader is back in local politics - but he will bow out again in under six months.

Conservative Ken Maddock won a Mendip District Council by-election by just four votes last Thursday (October 6).

He will represent the Butleigh and Baltonsborough ward until the start of April next year, when the district council will be abolished as a new unitary authority for Somerset comes into existence.

Mr Maddock, who beat the only other challenger Claire Sully (LibDem) with 393 votes to her 389, takes the place of Cllr Nigel Woollcombe-Adams, who died in July.

Mr Maddock has serviced on Mendip Council before, and was leader from 2003 to 2007.

He was also leader of Somerset County Council from 2009 until 2012, when he stepped down to "do other things".

But he says he has no intention of standing in the Somerset unitary council election next year.