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When voters went to the polls in May they did so amid a shift in UK politics. Gone are the days of the three-party state, we are now entering the era of multi-party politics. The real winner of the local elections was no overall control.Local government is no stranger to complex coalitions, but the depth of diversity and division has made pulling together a working leadership harder than ever for some authorities.Five months on, Oldham MBC still has no leader and no cabinet, leaving chief executive Shelley Kipling to take all the decisions under emergency powers. It is, she tells The MJ, ‘a weird situation'.‘We had nobody to move reports in full council,' she says. ‘We were having to suspend procedurals in council to allow officers to speak and I think that also gives the wrong message to the public.'Instead of a single leader, Kipling now works with a consultation group made up of all six political group leaders. Each leader has taken responsibility for a directorate, acting as a quasi-lead member, but with no decision-making powers. All councillors are invited to portfolio briefings, a pre-decision scrutiny panel reviews decisions before they are taken and the election of a leader is the first item at every full council.These arrangements were formalised in an interim governance paper agreed at full council, but the absence of a leader and a statutory lead member for children's services remains a legal problem.Kipling says: ‘In agreeing that [the interim governance], we knew we were agreeing something that wasn't fully legal and that was the challenge for us.'But she adds: ‘Whenever we were kind of hitting a speed bump… it was but what's the alternative? And if the alternative is going to have an impact on residents, we have to do something.'The situation may be unusual, but it was expected. Oldham has been in no overall control for three years, following the breakdown of its traditional three-party system and the rise of local independent groups.With a toxic atmosphere in the chamber – Oldham has seen protests, hostility, physical altercations and even police intervention at council meetings in recent years – it was always going to be tough to form a coalition.Yet in private, Kipling says, members are ‘entirely different', working together for the good of the community.'Individually, they're all great people… they all engage in that behaviour, but they're also victims of that behaviour.'Oldham anticipated a problem but never expected it to last so long. The Local Government Association (LGA) was already working on relationships between political factions and the last cabinet before the pre-election period took 38 decisions, with the first quarter mapped out to allow some breathing space.Kipling explains: ‘Our constitution wasn't as strong as it could have been to support an extended use of those emergency powers… the chief exec can use them in consultation with the leader, which, with no leader, makes that a little bit difficult.'As director of legal services and monitoring officer Alex Bougatef would usually look to case precedents. ‘There were no precedents… we were creating something new,' he says. ‘A lawyer will say, "Well, it's unlawful [what] you're proposing," but the issue is even if we don't do it, we're still acting unlawfully because we've not got a leader.'Conversations with monitoring officer colleagues elsewhere have exposed a lack of preparedness for fragmented politics in other authorities too. ‘The common theme is that no constitution is very strong on chief execs' emergency powers,' he says. ‘So they're all tweaking that now while they can, because obviously they see things coming down the road.'The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has been supportive, Kipling says, but ‘they are very firm in their position that we are acting unlawfully… and that we are under the very close, watchful eye of the department'.Local MP and former Oldham leader Jim McMahon, whose ministerial brief covers intervention, has stepped back. ‘Jim's been really clear, he's not allowed to be involved,' Kipling explains.Nor does the MHCLG want to see Oldham's model copied. ‘It would be a very uncomfortable position for them if a number of authorities felt that it was okay and that this was a reasonable position,' she adds.Oldham may be ahead of the curve, but fragmenting politics could see others follow in its footsteps. The advice from Oldham is to be prepared.In the meantime, with no time limit on the emergency powers, the arrangements will continue until councillors can agree on a leader.Political breakdown of Oldham MBCLabour: 18 seatsReform UK: 16 seatsOldham Group: 10 seatsLiberal Democrats: 6 seatsConservatives: 4 seatsIndependents: 3 seatsRoyton Independents: 2 seatsFailsworth Independent Party: 1 seatLessons for councils facing complex no overall controlReview the emergency powers clause in your constitution.Tighten amendment rules for multi-group councils.Plan for a leaderless first quarter before polling day.Clear decisions in the run-up to the election.Use LGA and MHCLG support early and be open with them.Treat poor political culture as everyone's problem

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GOVERNANCE

Leading when leaderless

By Heather Jameson | 28 October 2026

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