The petition of residents of the United Kingdom,
Declares that the County Council elections meant to take place in May 2025 should not be postponed indefinitely.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to ensure that the County Council Elections in West Sussex take place in May 2025.
And the petitioners remain, etc.—[Presented by Jess Brown-Fuller, Official Report, 23 January 2025; Vol. 760, c. 1205.]
[P003036]
Observations from The Minister for Local Government and English Devolution (Jim McMahon):
The “English Devolution White Paper” sets out how the Government plan to deliver on our manifesto pledge to transfer power out of Westminster through devolution and to fix the foundations of local government. The Government’s long-term vision is for simpler structures which make it much clearer for residents whom they should look to on local issues, with more strategic decisions to unlock growth and deliver better services for communities. Devolution over a large strategic geography, alongside local government reorganisation, can drive economic growth while delivering optimal public services and beginning to fix the foundations of local government.
In that letter, I set out that I had heard from some areas that the timing of elections affects their planning for devolution, particularly alongside reorganisation. I set out that, to help manage these demands, I would consider requests made by 10 January to delay elections. The list of councils that made requests that involve postponing their election from 2025 to 2026 is published at the same webpage as my letter. I also set out that these requests would only be considered where it is clear that postponement will help the area to deliver both reorganisation and devolution to the most ambitious timeframe. This is rightly a high bar to reach, and the Government’s starting point is for elections to go ahead unless there is strong justification.
West Sussex county council submitted, on 10 January, a request to postpone its election. This request was carefully considered against the criteria I have described above, and on 5 February the Deputy Prime Minister announced our decision to agree requests from nine councils to postpone their May 2025 election to May 2026 only. This included West Sussex. Postponement is essential for the delivery of the devolution priority programme and complementary reorganisation. In the areas where elections are postponed, plans for delivering new combined county authorities, inaugural mayoral elections, and local government reorganisation will all be concurrent and working to a very ambitious timetable.
There is well-established precedent for postponing elections, including in the cases of the North Yorkshire, Cumbria and Somerset elections, and the Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire district council elections, under the previous Government, when reorganisation happened in those areas. Between 2019 and 2022, the Government legislated to postpone 17 local council elections during preparatory local government reorganisation work.
I look forward to working with local leaders in West Sussex on delivering devolution and reform to local government.