Cornwall Council has been plunged into further chaos after two senior cabinet defections and a sacking.
The ructions at County Hall are the fallout from the executive's failed plan to raise council tax which was defeated by members, who instead voted through a freeze.
It has left Tory council leader Jim Currie accused of "weakness" by his party leader in Cornwall, Fiona Ferguson, who also resigned her cabinet post earlier this year over the introduction of "lie detector" tests for residents.
Carolyn Rule and Lance Kennedy have left the Conservative Party and joined coalition partners the Independent group.
Steven Rushworth, the portfolio holder for the economy, was sacked by Mr Currie on Thursday.
Mr Rushworth, a councillor in Padstow and the only cabinet member to oppose the failed plan to raise council tax, said he was hounded out of the executive by the Independent group who are now "running the show" at the council.
"Jim told me the Independent members can't work with me," he said.
"Cabinet members have voted against other members before – I am not the first by any stretch of the imagination and won't be the last.
"All the way through I have always expressed the same view as Fiona that I would like to explore a zero percentage rise."
Conservative group leader Fiona Ferguson has accused Mr Currie of "weakness".
Mrs Ferguson said Mr Currie, who was proposed by the opposition Liberal Democrats after previous leader Alec Robertson was sacked, is no longer a Conservative and has "gone independent".
However, she has refused to call for fellow Tory members in the cabinet to resign in protest, preferring to allow the executive to continue until elections in May.
"The Independents are definitely running the show," she said, adding that the sacking "suggests some weakness" on the part of Mr Currie.
"I am not in a position to influence the situation – he was proposed and elected by Liberal Democrats – he cannot be changed within six months so we just have to press on."
Mr Currie denied he was losing a grip on the authority, accusing Mr Rushworth of having a "beef".
"I am the only powerful person in the cabinet – I control it and decide who is in it," he added. "Steven Rushworth was completely unsupportive of the cabinet on the council tax issue and that was unacceptable – he is not compatible with the rest of the cabinet, it is as simple as that."
Mr Kennedy said he had resigned from the Conservative Party because he could no longer support the party after it joined with the Liberal Democrats to force through last Tuesday's budget which he says will see 135 council jobs axed.
He said he was "appalled to see fellow councillors laughing and cheering at the budget result at the same time as staff were in tears at the prospect of losing their jobs".
"What I witnessed on Tuesday was probably the worst example of cynical party politics that I have ever witnessed," he added.
"I cannot continue to be associated with a party that has chosen, even in these difficult times, to put party doctrine ahead of the people of Cornwall."
