No one was more surprised than George Nobbs when he became leader of Norfolk county council after an inconclusive election in 2013 that left Conservatives as the largest party without an overall majority. They assumed they could continue in power. It was not to be.

For Nobbs, as a Labour leader, with only 14 seats on an 84-member authority, permanent opposition appeared inevitable. But politics is nothing if not unpredictable. He was seen as a conciliator, the person to bridge a wide divide. “My task was to try to get other parties to work together for the good of the county… and we found we all could,” he recalls. “But yes, of course, it all came as a complete surprise to me.”

In a foretaste of what might happen in local elections tomorrow – never mind in Westminster – a deal was done to keep out the Conservatives. The smaller parties – Labour, Ukip and the Lib-Dems – combined in a loose alliance, with support from the Greens. They all promptly outvoted the Tories 10 days after polling day at the council’s annual meeting two years’ ago and formed a multi-party administration. It has every prospect of lasting until the next elections in 2017.

On the surface, it seems the ultimate “rainbow” alliance, so divergent in outlook and in ideology that it could never endure. Labour and Ukip each have 14 councillors, the Lib Dems 10, the Greens four and independents two – 44 in total against the Tories 40. “But there are absolutely no differences on local issues, and that is the honest truth,” insists Nobbs. “There is a greater unity of purpose than there would have been if the Conservatives had succeeded in staying in power. On national issues we are miles apart, but that does not intrude on the needs of Norfolk. We work together in ways I would never have thought possible.”