Local elections in nine areas will be delayed for a year to allow for a shake-up of the council structure, Angela Rayner has announced.
Votes scheduled for May would be postponed in East Sussex, West Sussex, Essex, Thurrock, Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Norfolk, Suffolk and Surrey, said the deputy prime minister, who is also the housing, communities and local government secretary.
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The reorganisation is part of Labour’s manifesto commitment to widen devolution.
The party wants to abolish the two-tier system of county and district councils and merge them together to create larger unitary authorities. It also wants more areas to have regional mayors.
Ms Rayner said that holding elections for bodies that were due to be scrapped would be “an expensive and irresponsible waste of taxpayers’ money”.
But the Tories accused her of creating “Orwellian-sounding” structures which are “closer to her and closer to Whitehall”.
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The delayed elections will be held in May 2026 after the expected reorganisation.
The nine areas make up half of the 18 councils that had written to Ms Rayner in January to be part of the first phase of restructuring, she told the Commons.
Ms Rayner said the government’s starting point “is for all elections to go ahead unless there’s a strong justification for postponement, and the bar is high”.
She added: “After careful consideration, I have only agreed to postpone elections in places where this is central to our manifesto promise to deliver devolution.
“We’re not in the business of holding elections to bodies that won’t exist and where we don’t know what will replace them. This would be an expensive and irresponsible waste of taxpayers’ money.”
As well as merging councils, the government wants more areas to have regional mayors like Greater Manchester’s Andy Burnham.
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‘More money in people’s pockets’
In her statement, Ms Rayner announced six new devolution areas which she hoped would get to elect new mayors in May 2026: Cumbria, Cheshire and Warrington, Greater Essex, Hampshire and Solent, Norfolk and Suffolk, and Sussex and Brighton.
A seventh area, Lancashire, is already deciding its mayoral devolution options and the government will look at leaders’ proposals in the autumn “in parallel with the priority programme”, Ms Rayner said.
She said the places named in her statement will “get a fast-track ticket to drive real change in their area”.
“While devolution can sound techie, the outcome is simple – it’s a plan for putting more money in people’s pockets, it’s a plan for quicker, better, cheaper transport designed with local people in mind, a plan for putting politics back in the service of working people.”
Not all councils are due to hold elections in May. The government has written to all other councils in two-tier areas to invite them to develop unitary proposals, which ministers argue will cut waste and improve accountability.
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‘Millions denied a vote’
The County Councils Network welcomed Wednesday’s announcement but said many areas will be disappointed they have not been selected for the priority programmes.
“There is clearly an appetite from many more county and unitary councils to move quickly and deliver devolution this Parliament.” said Councillor Tim Oliver, chairman of the group.
Opposition MPs from the left to the right attacked the plans.
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey called it a “stitch-up” between Labour and the Tories after his party made gains against the latter at the general election.
“Failing Tory-run councils are running scared and denying voters a chance to kick them out of office in May,” he said.
Responding for the Conservatives, shadow communities secretary Kevin Hollinrake said: “Contrary to the Deputy Prime Minister’s statement, she is not doing away with a two-tier system, she is simply creating a new tier of Orwellian-sounding strategic authorities which are closer to her and closer to Whitehall.”
Reform UK, which is hoping to make gains at the local elections, went furthest in its criticism, with party leader Nigel Farage saying it meant “five and half million people in this country are being denied their vote”.
“Now I thought only dictators cancelled elections, but no… this is the connivance of the now-terrified Labour Party,” he said.
