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I am writing this the day before polling day on the local government elections and you will be reading it afterwards, so any detailed predication about the results would be pointless.Moreover, this has been the most unpredictable set of elections in my political lifetime. I suspect that in more councils than ever, senior officers will read this edition of The MJ unsure who their new political masters will be.Many more of the councillors they must advise and work with will not only have no experience of local government, but often only very recent experience of organised politics at all. It is going to be a demanding journey and will require every ounce of the professionalism and patience that they can muster.I want to say this will pass, that it is a temporary spasm in the body politic, but I do not think it is. As likely as not, it is a ‘new normal' that we must all adjust to.The challenge will be to marry flexibility of thinking and working with realism and grounded advice, a willingness to think outside the box with a firm defence of the checks and balances that our system of representative democracy is based upon. That is as true at the local level as nationally.If we really care about local government and the value it brings to communities and individuals, we must be prepared to fight for them. We cannot assume progress is inevitable. Recent history across the globe shows it is not. The case for it must be made afresh with every generation.I was first elected as a councillor 52 years ago. A lot has changed since then. We had only just moved from three to four-year electoral terms. We elected our last ever set of aldermen.Councils established their own business rates. Having a chief finance officer had only recently become a statutory requirement. There was no requirement for a head of paid service or a monitoring officer. There were no shared staffing arrangements or caps. The Audit Commission was yet to come (and then go). There were markedly fewer statutory duties to meet. I could go on, but you get the picture.Much of the change has been for the good. The demands on local government have grown and become more complex as society has become more complex and the expectations that citizens have of the state have increased at all levels.Greater professionalism and transparency in local government have been chiefly for the good. However, some political actors now seem at least dismissive, if not hostile, to such concepts.If we really care about local government and the value it brings to communities and individuals, we must be prepared to fight for them. We cannot assume progress is inevitable. Recent history across the globe shows it is not. The case for it must be made afresh with every generation.When I started, the politics of local government was pretty much a Labour/Conservative duopoly, with a few liberals and independents thrown in. That has already been broken and this year's results may be the final nail in its coffin. The odds are that increasingly fragmented party politics is part of the new norm. That brings challenges.At a practical level, it will be fascinating to see how quickly members adapt to forming coalitions to make an administration – and how long they last. Will there be common patterns across the country or are will we see a political kaleidoscope? At the level of principle, how much democratic legitimacy is there if members are elected with under 25% of the vote in a five-way contest? Our first-past-the-post system never envisaged this on any scale. The odd maverick result, yes, but if that becomes commonplace, or even normal, would the public continue to trust a system that throws up those kinds of distortions?So much has changed, but some things have not. We are still a grossly over-centralised country. Councils lack proper revenue-raising powers and a formalised role in our legislature. Contrast this with the Bundesrat in Germany and the French senate, which are largely drawn from local government. Perhaps that is the next cause to pursue.Sir Bob Neill is a former local government minister

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POLITICS

Breaking the mould

By Bob Neill | 13 May 2026

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