Reform Council Leader: "Target is not to increase council tax next year"
Sean Matthews is the Leader of Reform UK on Lincolnshire County Council
Last updated 13th May 2025
The soon-to-be leader of Lincolnshire Council County, Sean Matthews, has been telling us his target is to freeze council tax.
Reform UK won 44 out of 70 seats in the council elections on May 1st, and have chosen the former police officer as their leader.
Sean Matthews will officially become leader of Lincolnshire County Council on 23rd May.
"The reality is my absolute target will be not to increase Council tax next year," said Cllr Matthews.
"It's gone up year after year for far too long. I would like to pause that. But the finances are in such a bad state that I can't promise anything at the moment.
"My aim is not to increase Council tax. I'd love to cut it, but I can't see that happening."
Reform's Dame Andrea Jenkyns was also elected as the first Mayor of Greater Lincolnshire on May 1st.
Speaking to LBC, the Mayor said she'd like to cut around 10% of the workforce in at least one Lincolnshire council.
We put this aim to Sean Matthews: "In my view, at the moment, there's nothing in the pipeline for that," he said.
"I don't know what our workforce strengths are. I don't know how many people we've got working. I don't even know how many people we've got working from home at the moment. I will do a piece of work on that.
"If there's a possibility of reducing - workplace costs are really expensive, so staffing costs are the major costs that we could cut back on.
"I'll look at it and if there's savings to be had, then we will talk about it. But it's very early days still for me to be able to commit to anything on that."
Reform now have four years to make a difference in Lincolnshire, with cutting waste their clear goal.
Although, they have big ambitions across the board.
"I want this Lincolnshire County Council not only to be the best Reform UK Council in the country, but the best run County Council in the country," said Cllr Matthews.
"So that's my aim. I want to be able to look back and say we did really, really well and we stand by what we've done."