On Thursday May 4th 2017, local elections were held up and down the country. Many thanks to everyone that joined the Out for the Count campaign to help us tell the story of these local elections. You helped us cover them from start to finish this year with the support of the County Councils Network (CCN).
Head over to our live blog to see the full coverage and our results map. Check out our final briefing on the results and our press statement here.
With theMJ we have now published our annual Map of Political Control which all subscribers to theMJ will have received. You can download a PDF of the map – MJ/LGiU Map of Political Control.
Who had elections on 4 May?
In England there were elections in 27 English county councils, 7 unitary authorities and 1 Metropolitan Borough
Council. That’s a total of 2,370 seats across England, while 6 city regions will also choose their first directly elected mayors and there are elections for mayors in Doncaster and North Tyneside councils.
One county council, Derbyshire is run by the Labour Party, 15 are run by the Conservative Party, and 11 have no overall political control, while Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council is a Labour authority.
All 32 Scottish councils are up for election. The SNP currently control Angus and Dundee City, whilst the Labour Party have control over Glasgow City, Renfrewshire, North Lanarkshire and West Dunbartonshire. Na h-Eileanan Siar, Orkney and Shetland are run by Independent groups. The other Scottish authorities are in no overall control.
All 22 Welsh councils are up for election. The Labour Party is in control of ten councils (Blaenau Gwent, Bridgend, Caerphilly, Cardiff, Merthyr Tydfil, Neath Port Talbot, Newport, Rhondda Cynon Taff, Swansea, and Torfaen). Pembrokeshire and Powys are controlled by Independent Groups. Nine councils are in no overall control. Results from the 2016 Local Elections
Councils having Elections by Political Control
Out for the Count campaign
Out for the Count is an awareness raising campaign dedicated to improving local democracy with a call for open and accessible local elections data across the UK.
Over the past six years, the LGiU has provided live local elections coverage and a results service with insights into what’s happening on the ground and what it means for the country as a whole. Telling the story of what’s happening in the locals and raising awareness of these issues is something we are proud to be continuing this year.
Out for the Count 2017 will be run in partnership between the Local Government Information Unit (LGiU) and the County Councils Network (CCN) working alongside the Democracy Club. With the help of hundreds of Count Correspondents (volunteers from local government and the wider community) we will crowdsource results live from counts taking place across the country as they come.
CCN is the national representative body for 37 county council and county unitary authorities, 32 of which are holding all-out elections this May. As part of their Your County Matters Campaign, they are supporting Out for the Count to promote the importance of county authorities, the services they provide and local democracy in Shire Counties, which cover 86% of England’s landmass and 47% of its population.
In 2016, with funding and support from the Open Data Institute and Democracy Club, Out for the Count delivered the UK’s first election results tracker for the local government elections on 5 May last year.
To sign up for our election night updates, email jen.pufky@lgiu.org.
Join Out for the Count 2017 by being a count correspondent, email roshni.mistry@lgiu.org.
To find out more about the Your County Matters campaign, email james.maker2@local.gov.uk.
Count Correspondents
Every year we ask for Count Correspondents who are attending local election counts to report back to us so that we can gather the results as fast as possible.
This year in partnership with the County Councils Network (CCN) working alongside the Democracy Club Out for the Count aims to provide greater transparency in local elections and more-informed choices for voters.
During the counts which take place from 10.00pm on Thursday – with some council counting overnight and others on Friday, Saturday and even Sunday – together, with our count correspondents, we feed the results into our live database as soon as possible. The LGiU team will have a manned live blog over the period, reporting the results via the blog and twitter and providing extra comment and insight.
Join Out for the Count 2017 by being a count correspondent, email roshni.mistry@lgiu.org.
Candidates Data
Councils across England and Wales have now published the official lists of candidates for the elections and Democracy Club have imported them into their website. They now need your help to take the useful data out of the PDFs and into their free, open database.
Polling Station Finder
Democracy Club are also offering an embeddable polling station finder (free) for your council’s website. This should help increase voter turnout and reduce calls on polling day, saving you money. For it to work for your area, you must have provided polling location data to Democracy Club.
Full list of Local Elections on 4 May
England
| Organisation | Type | Political Control |
| 1.Buckinghamshire | County Council | Conservative |
| 2.Cambridgeshire | County Council | No overall control |
| 3.Cumbria | County Council | No overall control |
| 4.Derbyshire | County Council | Labour |
| 5. Devon | County Council | Conservative |
| 6.Dorset | County Council | Conservative |
| 7.East Sussex | County Council | No overall control |
| 8.Essex | County Council | Conservative |
| 9.Gloucestershire | County Council | No overall control |
| 10.Hampshire | County Council | Conservative |
| 11.Hertfordshire | County Council | Conservative |
| 12.Kent | County Council | Conservative |
| 13.Lancashire | County Council | No overall control |
| 14.Leicestershire | County Council | Conservative |
| 15.Lincolnshire | County Council | No overall control |
| 16.Norfolk | County Council | No overall control |
| 17.North Yorkshire | County Council | Conservative |
| 18.Northamptonshire | County Council | Conservative |
| 19.Nottinghamshire | County Council | No overall control |
| 20.Oxfordshire | County Council | No overall control |
| 21.Somerset | County Council | Conservative |
| 22.Staffordshire | County Council | Conservative |
| 23.Suffolk | County Council | No overall control |
| 24.Surrey | County Council | Conservative |
| 25.Warwickshire | County Council | No overall control |
| 26.West Sussex | County Council | Conservative |
| 27.Worcestershire | County Council | Conservative |
| 28.Cornwall | Unitary Authority | No overall control |
| 29.County Durham | Unitary Authority | Labour |
| 30.Isle of Wight | Unitary Authority | No overall control |
| 31.Northumberland | Unitary Authority | No overall control |
| 32.Shropshire | Unitary Authority | Conservative |
| 33.Wiltshire | Unitary Authority | Conservative |
| 34.Isles of Scilly | Suis Generis Unitary | n/a |
| 35.Doncaster | Metropolitan Borough Council | Labour |
| Mayoral elections | |
| 1. Cambridgeshire and Peterborough | Combined Authority Mayor |
| 2. Greater Manchester | Combined Authority Mayor |
| 3. Liverpool City Region | Combined Authority Mayor |
| 4. Tees Valley | Combined Authority Mayor |
| 5. West of England | Combined Authority Mayor |
| 6. West Midlands | Combined Authority Mayor |
| 7. Doncaster | Mayoral |
| 8. North Tyneside | Mayoral |
Scotland
| 1. Aberdeen | No overall control |
| 2. Aberdeenshire | No overall control |
| 3. Angus | SNP |
| 4. Argyll & Bute | No overall control |
| 5. Clackmannanshire | No overall control |
| 6. Dumfries & Galloway | No overall control |
| 7. Dundee | SNP |
| 8. East Ayrshire | No overall control |
| 9. East Dunbartonshire | No overall control |
| 10. East Lothian | No overall control |
| 11. East Renfrewshire | No overall control |
| 12. Edinburgh | No overall control |
| 13. Eilean Siar | Independent |
| 14. Falkirk | No overall control |
| 15. Fife | No overall control |
| 16. Glasgow | Labour |
| 17. Highland | No overall control |
| 18. Inverclyde | No overall control |
| 19. Midlothian | No overall control |
| 20. Moray | No overall control |
| 21. North Ayrshire | No overall control |
| 22. North Lanarkshire | No overall control |
| 23. Orkney | Independent |
| 24. Perth & Kinross | No overall control |
| 25. Renfrewshire | Labour |
| 26. Scottish Borders | No overall control |
| 27. Shetland | Independent |
| 28. South Ayrshire | No overall control |
| 29. South Lanarkshire | Labour |
| 30. Stirling | No overall control |
| 31. West Dunbartonshire | Labour |
| 32. West Lothian | No overall control |
Wales
| Wales | Political Control |
| 1. Blaenau Gwent | Labour |
| 2. Bridgend | Labour |
| 3. Caerphilly | Labour |
| 4. Cardiff | Labour |
| 5. Carmarthenshire | No overall control |
| 6. Ceredigion | No overall control |
| 7. Conwy | No overall control |
| 8. Denbighshire | No overall control |
| 9. Flintshire | No overall control |
| 10. Gwynedd | Plaid Cymru |
| 11. Isle of Anglesey | No overall control |
| 12. Merthyr Tydfil | Labour |
| 13. Monmouthshire | No overall control |
| 14. Neath Port Talbot | Labour |
| 15. Newport | Labour |
| 16. Pembrokeshire | Independent |
| 17. Powys | Independent |
| 18. Rhondda Cynon Taff | Labour |
| 19. Swansea | Labour |
| 20. Torfaen | Labour |
| 21. Vale of Glamorgan | No overall control |
| 22. Wrexham | No overall control |
