Rugby Borough Council to decide on scrapping May’s Local Elections
Councillors in charge of Rugby Borough Council will decide whether to ask the government to scrap May’s local elections on Thursday
Rugby Borough Council’s cabinet will decide on Thursday whether to ask the government to cancel May’s local elections.
The national government has asked for the views of all councils that are scheduled to go through the process of local government reorganisation and hold ballots this year to establish whether votes should go ahead.
The switch to unitary councils – bringing the services currently handled by Warwickshire County Council and the area’s district and borough councils under one level of local government – is due to be completed by April 2028.
If that goes to plan, elections to the new authority would be held in May 2027, meaning any borough councillors elected this year would only serve a maximum of two years, one of which partly subservient to the new authority.
The cabinet – the panel of six Labour councillors in charge of major service areas – will decide on whether to request the cancellation or not, although the final decision rests with national government.
A cabinet paper, authored by Rugby Borough Council chief executive Dan Green, estimates that £160,000 would be saved by scrapping them but also confirms that the area’s five parish council elections must still go ahead.
It asks the cabinet to consider whether the cancellation would “release resources” to “better enable” reorganisation work with the council “likely to see considerable activity” during 2026.
Noting how the government’s concerns over the capacity at councils are countered by the Electoral Commission, it suggests “members (of the borough council) may wish to extend the case that the process of local government reorganisation will be extremely resource intensive” and leans on the “overriding requirement to ensure that services to residents must be maintained alongside the major task preparing for the biggest change to local government structures in over fifty years”.
However, Mr Green advises that “preparations for the forthcoming elections are progressing” with venue bookings, printing arrangements and systems “in place”.
“He is satisfied that the council can deliver a lawful and transparent election, should the May 2026 elections go ahead,” it adds.
The main arguments for not holding the elections are that they would further stretch council resources that are already strained by tight local government reorganisation deadlines and waste public money.
However, the Conservative opposition published a letter in the aftermath.
Signed by borough group leader Councillor Derek Poole (Wolston & the Lawfords) and his counterpart at county council level Councillor Adrian Warwick (Fosse), it calls for the elections to go ahead.
Arguing that the government’s decision on how to progress reorganisation in Warwickshire will not be known until after the elections anyway, the case is made that “residents deserve to have their say” on Labour’s decisions on the emerging local plan and push to acquire Rugby Central.
They also assert that elections should only be cancelled “if there is no possible alternative” and “that is not remotely the case”, a different position to that taken by then-leader of Warwickshire County Council Izzi Seccombe OBE when she asked for that authority’s 2025 elections to be cancelled for similar reasons.
Reform UK does not have any borough seats in Rugby but they are polling well and run Warwickshire County Council. Leader Councillor George Finch (Bedworth Central) has also objected to any cancellation.
Rugby’s Liberal Democrats, the group that supports Labour’s minority administration at the Town Hall, have questioned whether holding the ballots makes sense.
Rugby Borough Council holds its elections in thirds. It has 14 areas each served by three councillors who each start and end their four-year cycles in different years. The only years that Rugby does not hold standard borough elections are the one in four allocated for county elections.
A post on the Lib Dem’s social media platform read: “Some people feel elections should continue right up to the end to keep democratic accountability strong, others question whether it makes sense to hold full elections for a council that will exist for only a short time and mainly manage the transition to the new authority.
“The key issue is whether councillors elected in 2026 would have enough real influence to justify another full election, or whether the council would largely act as a caretaker body ahead of reorganisation.
“Is spending £160,000 of taxpayers money on the Borough Council 2026 election a waste of council tax? That means a lot of money is being spent to change only a third of the council, for councillors who will be in post for a short time and mainly manage the council’s closure.”