Most of these seats in England were last up for election in 2022. Some of these elections were postponed from 2025.[2][3]
On the same day, there will also be elections to the Welsh Senedd and the Scottish Parliament[4].
Background
The 2025 local elections were described as a sweeping victory for Reform UK. The party placed first, winning the most seats and took control of a number of local authorities.[5] The governing Labour Party and opposition Conservative Party suffered historic losses. This was the first time that Labour finished fourth in a local election; they were the first elections under the premiership of Keir Starmer.[6] There were major gains for the Liberal Democrats who won new councils.[7]
The English Devolution White Paper on 16 December 2024 set out the Labour government's plans for local government reorganisation, involving the remaining two-tier counties of England being abolished with elections to new unitary authorities. Some of the elections scheduled for May 2025 were delayed by a year in order to allow reorganisation to take place.[2][9] At least 13 of the 21 county councils asked the government to delay their elections.[10] On 5 February 2025, the government announced that elections to nine councils (seven county councils and two unitary authorities) would not take place in 2025 to allow restructuring to take place, with elections to reformed or newly created replacement authorities taking place in 2026.[3]
By November 2025, it had been announced that Surrey County Council and the districts included in it would be replaced by new unitary authorities, but the government have said that other initially-scheduled 2025 elections will take place in the existing local government structure unless there is "strong justification otherwise", with the process of creating new unitary authorities delayed.[11][12] Under the current statutory calender as set out by The Local Authorities (Changes to Years of Ordinary Elections) (England) Order 2025, elections for the areas cancelled in 2025 will take place in 2026[13] until a new statutory instrument is issued.
Elections for all councillors in all thirty-two London boroughs will be held in 2026 in line with their normal election schedule. The previous elections to London borough councils were held in 2022, which saw Labour win its second-best result in any London election and the Conservatives return their lowest-ever number of councillors in the capital.
There are thirty-six metropolitan boroughs, which are single-tier local authorities. Thirty-two of them have an election in 2026 (Doncaster, Liverpool, Wirral and Rotherham do not). Of these, Birmingham City Council and St Helens Council hold their elections on a four-year cycle from 2022, so are due to hold an election in 2026. In 2025 Barnsley Council held a public consultation regarding the permanent adoption of the whole council election cycle, which has since been confirmed.[15] The council is going to hold their elections on a four-year cycle starting from 2026. The remaining twenty-nine councils generally elect a third of their councillors every year for three years with no election in each fourth year, on the same timetable which includes elections in 2026. Thirteen of these metropolitan borough councils have all of their councillors up for election in 2026 rather than the usual one-third, following ward boundary changes from their LGBCE electoral review. All thirteen will likely be reverting to thirds in 2027, 2028 and 2030.
Most of these unitary authorities elect councillors in thirds, with councillors elected in 2022 up for reelection in 2026.
Swindon and Milton Keynes elect councillors by thirds, but have all seats up in 2026 due to new ward boundaries. Thurrock and Isle of Wight both have all-up elections delayed from 2025. East Surrey and West Surrey are both newly-created councils with all councillors to be elected.
↑Davey served as Acting Leader from 13 December 2019 to 27 August 2020 alongside the Party Presidents Baroness Sal Brinton and Mark Pack, following Jo Swinson's election defeat in the 2019 general election. Davey was elected Leader in August 2020.[1]
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