Bristol City Council will hold a referendum in May on whether to keep its 10-year-old mayoral model or switch to a committee system.

Councillors yesterday voted 41 to 24 in favour of a motion by Lib Dem Alex Hartley who argued that the mayoral system in Bristol had ‘centralised executive power to the detriment of citizens' engagement in the decisions that affect their lives and reduced the accountability of the city's governance'.