Delayed Elections Mean £280m Council Tax Hike: What Voters Need to Know

Councils that voted to delay elections have increased council tax by £280m in the past five years. Twenty-eight local authorities, 22 of them Labour-run, have applied to postpone elections scheduled for May. They claimed a simultaneous local government reorganisation would be too much of a distraction for the ballots to go ahead as planned. It means 3.7 million voters will have not be able to deliver their verdict on council tax increases in what the Tories have called a “disgraceful attack on democracy”. The highest council tax rises have been at Thurrock, in Essex, where the Labour-run council has put up bills by 28.4 per cent since 2021/22, adding £398 for Band D households. Thurrock has cancelled its elections, even though it is expected to put up the levy by the permitted maximum of 5 per cent in April. The Telegraph is campaigning to scrap the Communities Secretary’s power, under the 2000 Local Government Act, to arbitrarily cancel elections. The demand has been backed by opposition leaders and constitutional experts, who argued that there was a “clear conflict of interest” in letting politicians decide whether the public should have a chance to vote them out. The Conservatives, Reform and the Liberal Democrats have accused Sir Keir Starmer of “running scared” of the electorate at a time when polls show a collapse in support for Labour. Sir James Cleverly, the shadow communities secretary, said: “Labour-run councils are running scared of voters. Families in areas where elections have been cancelled have already been hit with £280m in rises over the past five years, with millions more planned next. “By cancelling these elections for 3.7 million people ministers are denying the public a right to vote on councils that are about to force through further tax hikes. “We have always said these elections should go ahead. Ministers must stop treating voters with contempt, end this democracy-denying move and let local people decide who runs their communities.” Analysis by the TaxPayers’ Alliance has found that, among the 28 councils that have applied to postpone elections, the amount raised in increased council tax since 2021/22 was £283.7m. These councils will increase their council tax take by £71.4m next year. The analysis found that after Thurrock, the council asking to postpone elections that had most increased its bills was East Sussex, where the Tories have the most seats, with £323 – 20.9 per cent – extra. Third was Blackburn with Darwen, a Labour authority, with a rise of £332, or 20.3 per cent. The council that has raised the most in extra council tax since 2021/22 is Tory-run West Sussex. Darwin Friend, the research director at the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Councils that cancel elections while hiking council tax are imposing taxation without representation. “Millions of residents are being forced to pay more while being denied the chance to vote out the councillors responsible. The law must be changed.” The potential delays come amid a huge reorganisation of local government, with district councils scrapped and merged with their counties to form new unitary authorities, delivering all services. As these have to represent fewer than 500,000 people, it means some county councils will be split up. Last month, Steve Reed, the Communities Secretary, gave 63 councils the opportunity to postpone elections for a year if they believed it would interfere with the reorganisation. Although 28 said they wished to do so, the other 35 rejected the plans.