Local Elections 2025 wrap-up from Jonathan Carr-West, LGIU’s Chief Executive

Beyond doubt, it’s been a successful day for Nigel Farage’s party in these elections. They won the Runcorn by-election (albeit by the tightest of margins). They have taken the Mayoralities in Greater Lincolnshire and Hull and East Yorkshire. They have won hundreds of council seats, and ten councils, including nine counties and one unitary.

That’s a pretty seismic event – especially given how hard it is for new parties to break through in the UK’s first past the post system. And, Reform UK went into these local elections with just a handful sitting councillors across England. Many, not least Reform themselves, will see this as a revolutionary moment of change in British politics: an end to the domination of the two main parties.

But there are other stories we think need to be told about today’s results, and these paint a more nuanced picture.

All politics really is local

Firstly, we should remind ourselves of the difficulty in reading across from local elections to national politics. What do these elections tell us about a general election that is still four years away? Probably nothing.

There’s also the question of what’s driving the Reform vote. Is it a vote for something or a vote against the status quo? While elections always create an illusion of suddenness, this vote has not come out of nowhere. At the last general election, the two main parties got their lowest vote ever. There are multiple data points that show growing levels of disengagement and declining trust in politics. The annual polling we do with Ipsos in the lead up to the locals revealed this year that only one in four voters trust national politicians to act in the best interest of their community, and less than half trust local politicians to do so.

We don’t yet have turnout figures, but early indications are that we can expect this disillusionment to be reflected in a low number of people actually going to vote.

We have also seen Liberal Democrats and  Greens taking seats in these elections, suggesting both that there is widespread disaffection with the two largest parties and that, as John Curtice and others have argued, we are now in a five-party system crammed uncomfortably into a voting system designed for two.

Nothing local government hasn’t seen before

But while from a national perspective, this looks like a huge change and upheaval, with a local government lens, it seems far more familiar.

Before these elections, there were already 122 councils in no overall control across the country. Over the last few electoral cycles, we have seen growing numbers of councillors from outside the major parties and very new councillors taking leading roles in administrations. Local government is familiar with rainbow coalitions of all types, and at a council level, we have seen elected mayors from outside the main parties in Bristol, Doncaster, Middlesbrough, and other places.

Local government has the systems, the checks and balances, and the professional staffing to make this work.

That’s partly about the nature of delivery in local government. As people enter new leadership positions in local government, they will discover that their room for manoeuvre is limited: they are constrained by funding, by statutory obligation, and they need to work collaboratively with other parties, with other public sector institutions, and indeed, with communities.

They are also likely to experience a sharp encounter with the realities of SEN deficits, the social care funding gap, and the ever-lurking threat of judicial review. Driving service transformation, navigating reorganisation, and steering towards financial sustainability will be challenging (to put it mildly) and necessitate a very steep learning curve.

Again, local government is used to this and to supporting new leaders and cabinets through this.

But it is once again a stark reminder that, in the end, these elections are not about national politics – they are about electing the people who will be making tough decisions about vital services over the months and years. The public recognises this – our polling consistently shows that people see councils as the organisation that has the biggest impact on their lives. But these decisions are shaped by local context, need, and aspiration. Often, they rely on plural, relational approaches to governance, and this is one of the great strengths of local democracy in this country.

It is for this reason that we should congratulate those who have secured seats in these elections and ensure they are supported in the days and weeks ahead. We should also thank those who stood and were unsuccessful. This is no easy task in today’s increasingly febrile political climate, but why it makes it all the more important that individuals continue to put themselves forward.

So when we look at the overall picture of these elections, we need to remember these local perspectives. The rise of Reform is one of the stories today, but it is not the only one.

 

How has the political landscape shifted in councils where elections took place?

Council control before the 2025 elections

Council control after the 2025 elections

Council control before the 2025 local elections

Council control after the 2025 Local Elections

Council control in 2025 Local Election areas before the elections

Council control in 2025 Local Election areas after the elections

 

 

How have things changed with the mayoral elections?

 

Political control of combined authorities before the 2025 Local Elections:

Political control of combined authorities after the 2025 Local Elections:

 

The full regional breakdown

East of England

The East of England only had two councils up for election this year – both counties and both, in their own way, important tests of the major parties.

In Cambridgeshire, the Liberal Democrats aimed to change their current coalition to a full majority, and in that they succeeded. With a razor-thin majority of 1 seat, they now hold 31 of the council’s 61 seats, and will now govern as a majority for the first time in the council’s history (which has only ever been Conservative or No Overall Control until now).

Hertfordshire, on the other hand, was a test for the Conservatives. They had a healthy majority, but inevitably suffered heavy losses to both the Liberal Democrats and Reform UK, with their presence on the council down from 46 to 22 of the 78 seats. The council is now under No Overall Control, and the Liberal Democrats are the largest party with 31 seats.

Before the elections

After the elections

East Midlands

There were several notable contests in the East Midlands, all of which the Conservatives were looking to defend.

Nottinghamshire was the least secure of the East Midlands councils for the Conservatives, who were ahead by just four seats. This marginal majority has been replaced by a healthier one for Reform UK, who now hold 40 of the council’s 64 seats. Labour too suffered losses here, down from 14 to 4 seats, with no councillors elected for the Greens or Lib Dems.

In Derbyshire, the Conservatives started from a stronger position, with 45 out of 64 seats; however, this was not enough to quell the insurgent rise of Reform UK in the county, who now hold the council with 42 seats, leaving the Conservatives with 12.

Until today, Leicestershire County Council was under Conservative control, and had been since the early 2000s. Their seemingly unassailable lead over all other parties was again not enough to hold the council, which is now under No Overall Control. Reform UK is the largest party in the council.

Before today, the Conservatives held 54 of the 70 seats on Lincolnshire County Council. They now hold 14. Reform UK – who held no seats on the council prior to this – now hold 44 and have taken control of the council. Reform UK’s success here was widely predicted – or at least anticipated – and because of Andrea Jenkyns’ election, Lincolnshire will now be governed at two tiers of subnational governance by Reform.

The two unitary councils of North Northamptonshire and West Northamptonshire both have similar compositions going into these elections: large Conservative majorities with smaller Labour groups in second place. In North Northamptonshire, a near-total wipeout of Conservative councillors has resulted in Reform UK taking the council, with a healthy majority. In West Northamptonshire, heavy losses from the Conservatives, and moderate losses from Labour, have resulted in Reform gaining swathes of seats and thus a slim majority in the council.

Before the elections

After the elections

 

North East

Although there were only a handful of elections in the North East, the results remain incredibly significant.

As was the case before the election, Northumberland County Council remains under No Overall Control. Both the Conservatives and Labour took losses here, with Reform UK gaining 23 seats on the council, while the Conservatives remain the largest party on the council.

Prior to the election, Labour held the largest number of councillors on Durham County Council, but the multiparty coalition that governed this No Overall Control council has been substituted outright by the sweeping force of Reform UK, who won an astounding 65 seats out of a total of 98. Reform held 0 seats in the previous administration, so this result is truly one of the most remarkable outcomes of yesterday’s polls.

There was less drama in the contest for the directly elected mayor of North Tyneside, where outgoing Labour mayor Norma Redfearn passed the baton on to her colleague Karen Clark, who emerged victorious from the contest. However, she did so by fewer than 500 votes. Yikes!

Before the elections

After the elections

North West

The sole authority in the North West with elections this year was Lancashire County Council, where the Conservatives had held control since 2017. Owing to the very modest majority commanded by the incumbents, Conservative control was always going to be vulnerable. However, it was extraordinarily overturned by Reform UK, who won 53 of the 84 seats, with the Conservatives down from 48 to a mere 8. Labour too suffered heavy losses, losing 27 of their 32 seats, while Green and the Liberal Democrats made marginal gains.

Before the elections

After the elections

South East

In Oxfordshire County Council, the state of play going into these elections was that the Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats were all within a few seats of one another. It was thus a decidedly difficult result to call. Ultimately, however, Oxfordshire is significant in that it is one of the few results where a party other than Reform has won overall control of a council. With 36 of the 69 seats on the council, and the Tories down from 25 to 5, the marginal majority is a triumph for Ed Davey’s party, whose successes today have been more limited than those of Reform, but greater than other mainstream parties.

Kent County Council, with 62 of the available 81 seats, was the Conservative Party’s council to lose, but no one could have foreseen the scale at which this council changed political control. From 62 seats to 5, the Tories have been wiped out in a traditionally Conservative area. Reform UK won by a landslide here, from 0 seats to a whopping 57.

Finally, the unitary council of Buckinghamshire – the least competitive of all the councils in England with elections this year. Before the elections, the Conservatives held 105 of the 147 seats on the council, and the next biggest party, the Liberal Democrats, held only 13. However, significant boundary changes, which resulted in a notably slimmer elected body of 97 councillors, mean that any precedent is no longer strictly comparable. Ultimately, the Conservatives fell just short of retaining political control over the county, and it is now under No Overall Control.

Before the electionsAfter the elections

South West

Significant gains by Reform UK, Liberal Democrat and Green in Gloucestershire County Council overturned the moderate majority held by the Conservative Party. Down from 30 seats to 6 of the 55 on the council, it was not a good night for Kemi Badenoch’s Party. The council is now under No Overall Control.

In the last Cornwall Council elections, the Conservatives won a majority, but after a series of resignations and defections, the unitary authority has been under No Overall Control for several months. This year, however, the Conservatives were by no means close to repeating this feat, and severe losses to Independent, Liberal Democrat and Reform UK candidates mean that the region will continue to be governed under No Overall Control, though with different parties at the helm.

Wiltshire was another key defence for the Conservatives, who held 61 of the 98 seats on the council prior to these elections. However, gains by the Liberal Democrats mean that they are now the largest party in the elected body, though they are just short of a majority and the council will thus be governed under No Overall Control.

The Conservatives also saw heavy losses in Devon with their 39 seats reduced to a mere 7 in the 60 seat council. 18 seats apiece to Reform and the Liberal Democrats means that the council joins the long list of authorities which are now under No Overall Control.

Before the elections

After the elections

West Midlands

Before today, Shropshire was the only of the four councils up for election in the West Midlands was not under a Conservative majority. Now there are none, and a triumph for the Liberal Democrats means that they now govern the council as a majority, making significant gains from the Conservatives. Reform’s advancement here is more limited than in its neighbours, but is still undeniably present.

It was thought that Worcestershire County Council was likely to stay under Conservative control after these elections. However, with the Conservatives losing 33 of their 45 seats on the council, and Reform gaining 27, the contest resulted in a No Overall Control council. The Greens and Liberal Democrats made marginal gains here, while there is a notable absence of the Labour Party, who won just 2 of the council’s 57 seats.

In Warwickshire County Council, the Conservatives went into this election as the biggest party by far, yet their control of 42 of the 57 council seats has been reduced to just 9 seats. They are now the third largest party in the council, behind Reform and the Liberal Democrats, who won 23 and 14 seats, respectively. The council is thus under No Overall Control.

Finally, Staffordshire County Council, where Reform emerged triumphant. The Conservatives held 56 of the 62 seats on the council before this election, but Reform UK has snatched up the overwhelming majority of them. Nigel Farage’s party now holds 49 of the 62 council seats, with the former incumbents a distant second with 10.

Before the elections

After the elections

Yorkshire and the Humber

There was only one ‘ordinary’ council election in Yorkshire and the Humber this year: the elections in Doncaster which is in the unusual position of electing its full council and directly elected mayor at the same time. While the Labour party successfully defended the mayoralty, the council was taken comfortably by Reform. Doncaster – Ed Miliband town and the only Labour defence of the night – will now have a Reform UK council.

Before the elections

After the elections