Is it a bid for reform or a plan to stop Reform UK?
How you see the apparent plans to cancel some council elections in the UK depends on where you sit in the partisan spectrum.
First, the basic facts: as with the US, local units of governments across the country come in a mishmash of different types. In some areas, there are relatively powerful local units of government, and in others, there is a dispersal of power in which there are two rather than one local sovereigns, sort of like counties and city councils.
There are yearly council elections which are both important because the councils have local powers AND because they are seen as indications of which ways the political winds are blowing. There is real power at the local level being chosen, but also symbolic power because the partisan distribution of elected councils is a measure of the country's mood. Don't take this description of the situation to the bank because it is a thumbnail sketch oversimplified because the details don't matter.
The Labour government is proposing reforms to the current distribution of power in some local areas, intending to abolish some local councils and transfer their duties to a stronger, larger local government in the name of efficiency. In those areas where, coincidentally, the Tories have more power currently, these elections may be canceled.
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— Henry Riley (@HenryRiley1) December 16, 2024
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Labour argues that the elections will be unnecessary as the councils will soon be abolished (in the next four years); Nigel Farage of Reform UK argues that the goal is to prevent the growth of power for Reform UK. Reform, for the most part, increases its support at the expense of the Tories. G
Local elections could be delayed for up to a year for councils that are being overhauled, Angela Rayner has said.
The deputy prime minister made the admission while outlining the government's devolution plans, which will see some smaller, district councils combined into bigger "strategic authorities" with more sway over their areas.
Earlier in the day housing minister Jim McMahon said some local elections may not go ahead next year for those that have chosen to merge.
Asked whether some elections could be delayed, Ms Rayner told reporters: "We're asking people to come forward as quickly as possible, and if they're near enough to a deal and they say: 'Well, you know, we just need a few more months, and then we can put that system in place'.
"If they came to us and said 'that's where we're at', then we may look at postponing, but it wouldn't be for longer than a couple of months, a year."
Labour's manifesto promised to "deepen" and "widen" devolution, with more areas expected to take on the mayoral combined authority (CA) model like that headed by Sadiq Khan in Greater London.
Local elections are held every year in May - but Mr McMahon told LBC some councils "essentially won't exist" if they make a request for reorganisation under the devolution proposals.
Given that the elections come yearly and the reforms are years away, the Labour argument seems a bit weak. Especially given that a council with a different ideological makeup might not want to give up its political role.
Cancelling elections in some areas of the country where Reform are gaining momentum is the act of a desperate government.
— Nigel Farage MP (@Nigel_Farage) December 16, 2024
They have the audacity to call us a “threat to democracy” whilst they act like third world dictators.
Obviously Farage benefits from stirring up anger and suspicion about anything that looks like it harms the Reform Party, and he is being accused of latching onto a benign act in order to generate outrage that redounds to his benefit.
True. But the Labour government and the entire political establishment HATES and fear Reform and has made it clear that their goal is to destroy the party and will do pretty much anything to undermine its growth. The Tories fear them because any increase in Reform's power comes mainly at their expense, and Labour hates them because Reform's growth threatens their already weak government and provides a populist alternative to their technocratic and anti-working-class agenda.
It is JUST within the realm of possibility that Labour (and the Tories, to be fair) don't have a hidden political agenda in suggesting these 'reforms,' but probably not more likely than the speculation that the drone sightings in New Jersey and at Wright Patterson AFB are really alien craft with anticollision lights.
It's not like the UK is the only place canceling elections in Europe. The EU engineered the canceling of the Romanian elections, and that was a nationwide vote. The excuse was that RUSSIA RUSSIA RUSSIA was interfering on behalf of conservative candidates.
In Germany, some Members of Parliament are trying to ban the AfD because they are too "right-wing." And remember when Georgia Meloni was accused of being a follower of Mussolini?
Europe is moving away from popular sovereignty, with the elite trying to replace Constitutional governance with a technocracy. It is the central battle of our times in that region of the world.
So color me skeptical when claims are made that this move is totally innocent.
