East Sussex County council leaders are requesting May’s local elections be suspended, as part of a bid to become one of the first places to go through a major reorganisation process.
On Thursday, January 9, the ESCC cabinet agreed to write to the government and express the council’s commitment to aid in the creation of the new unitary and mayoral authorities, set out in a recent policy announcement.
This will involve applying to join the government’s Devolution Priority Programme — a scheme intended to fast track the establishment of mayoral authorities. Locally, this is expected to see a new mayor, who would represent the entirety of Sussex, take on devolved powers from central government.
In a connected process, the council also committed to be involved in developing a proposal for unitary council in East Sussex.

Alongside this, cabinet members also agreed to ‘invite’ the government to postpone the county council elections due to take place in May this year — a move critics characterised as an outright ‘cancellation’.
Conservative council leader Keith Glazier defended the request, arguing the authority would not have the staffing and resources to both run elections and do the work necessary to be part of the first wave of councils to transition to the new system — a position he argued would result in the best outcome for the county.
He said: “The people of East Sussex deserve the best that is on offer. Whether we like it or not, the political mandate was given to the current government in July of last year and they have set out their way of dealing and they are very clear that this will happen before the end of this term.
“The bottom line is that we can be in there shaping it or we can be falling behind.”
He added: “A question we will be asked if we get on to the [Devolution Priority] Programme is are we confident that with the staff and the officer [available] to us that we can deliver what we are saying by May 2026 and 2027.
“The answer to that, without suspending elections, is I couldn’t [be confident].”
The council’s opposition parties took a different view, with Labour, Liberal Democrat and Greens all arguing the elections should go ahead. These arguments were made plain during an extraordinary full council meeting, which took place immediately before the cabinet meeting.
During this meeting, which the LDRS understands was called by the authority’s Green Party group, councillors debated a motion calling on the council to publicly state a view that May’s elections should go ahead.
Speaking in favour of the motion, Green Party councillor Wendy Maples said: “Whether we think the changes proposed by government are more opportunity or more threat, they are change and change gives, or should give residents the opportunity to reflect anew on what they want.
“Denying residents a vote is a very serious decision. It says ‘I know better’. I have been in this role for three-and-a-half years and what I can say is that you don’t. You don’t know better, our residents do.”
Cllr Maples went on to accuse the minority Conservative administration of seeking to hold on to political power until the county council’s abolition — a process which could last at least three years. This is because the new unitary authority, expected to hold elections in 2027 at the earliest, is considered likely to spend a year ‘shadowing’ the existing council structure before taking on its full responsibilities.
Liberal Democrat Kathryn Field shared a similar view. She said: “We have elections scheduled for May. We are elected for four years; the public knows that and the public knows that they have a right, every four years, to express their view on what is being done on their behalf by their councillors.
“I accept that we have to go ahead [with the reorganisation], but we should give the public the right to have their say on what we are going to be doing, because we are doing it for them on their behalf.”
Similar arguments were made by other opposition groups, with Labour councillors including Chris Collier and Christine Robinson stressing how the suspension of elections was not a mandatory element of the government’s Devolution Priority Programme.
However, the motion was voted down with the council’s three Independent members — Charles Clark and former Conservatives Abul Azad and Sam Adeniji — voting alongside the Conservative group to defeat the proposal 23 votes to 21.

During the wider debate, several opposition councillors took aim at the government, with some arguing that the reorganisation was happening too quickly and would result in an ineffective system of local government.
Liberal Democrat Stephen Holt was among those to make this argument. He said: “It is disturbing that any authority is expected to respond to government proposals that were published just before Christmas 10 days into the new year.
“With the financial struggles of this authority replicated across the country in many other authorities, tackling the financial deficit whilst protecting services should be the priority.”
He added: “In short, this is a rushed process forced upon us by national government and as a result has had little consultation with residents and key stakeholders. This is wrong.”
This view was disputed by Labour’s Godfrey Daniel, who argued a unitary authority would serve residents better than the current two-tier system.
Cllr Daniel said: “I think there is a strong case for a unitary authority personally. I know that will upset people who have seats on boroughs and districts, but as far as the people out there are concerned, they don’t really worry about structure, they worry about services.
“When somebody tells me they’ve got a drain blocked and I have to ask them ‘is it blocked at the top with leaves in which case the borough council has to clean it, or is it blocked underneath in which case it is the county council’s [responsibility].’”
Cllr Daniel also opened debate around what a new unitary authority should look like, joining with others to argue in favour of a “coastal strip” rather than a unitary council which follows the county council’s current boundaries.
Some councillors — like Cllr Daniel — argued this would better reflect the character of the area. But others argued this may be unfeasible, particularly given the short time frame councils have to come up with proposals and the stipulations set out by the government.
After lengthy debate across both meetings, Conservative cabinet members agreed to write to the government on all three measures.
This includes bidding to be part of the government’s Devolution Priority Programme on the basis of creating a new mayoral combined authority for the Sussex area. This proposal also saw support from West Sussex County Council and Brighton and Hove Council during similar meetings held the same day.
Image Credits: KT Bruce , Russell Hall .
Surely the big story here is about the proposals for a unitary authority which will, if successful, remove tiers of local government (in our case Rother) and put in place one authority covering east and West Sussex headed by an elected mayor. This could lead to significant changes in the way that town and parish councils interact with that authority. This may be a good thing or a bad thing dependant upon what the proposals look like and how much they take account of town and parish councils.
Huffing and puffing about losing a vote for a couple of years seems to be missing the point, especially as in the last ESCC election only 35.27% of us bothered to turn out and in the last RDC election only 36%.
The White Paper wants an elected (actually selected) mayor for the whole of Sussex making the police and grime commissaire redundant! To achieve that all six councils in East Sussex will be merged into one reducing the voice and influence of smaller communities more than an hour’s drive from Lewes like Rye and Northiam. But it is only a proposal. The White Paper insists that local councils will have populations of at least half a million. There’s no evidence that the public want to put their trust in just one elected mayor. Government plans to consult the public first before our recently elected MPs have the final say. So how can one minister unilaterally cancel next May’s elections before we know the views of the public and elected MPs? And of one thing we can be certain – this reorganisation, like others before it, will bear heavy costs in redundancy payments and staff restructuring, gobbling up any potential savings.
Cllr Godfrey Daniels, as usual talks lots of sense in his comments quoted in the article above. The divisions in responsibility between District and County Councils are often baffling and seemingly arbitrary, when as in the case of the Marley Rd to Ferry Rd footpath a resident emailed me and asked my support to improve access for people with a disability I could have said sorry that’s a County Council issue however, that would only cause frustration and annoyance. My view is that Unitary Councils offer consistency and a better service generally but then my working life has almost always been for Unitaries so I might be biased.
My understanding is that the figure of 500k population is not written in stone and there is a good argument that a “Coastal Strip” Unitary would better reflect an identity and sense of place, again something I agree with Cllr Daniels on. We must get this right however so a delayed election whilst going for a fast track route to devolution is not consistent with getting an outcome that works for our area, especially when there is no over all control at East Sussex County Council, the lack of a mandate from voters means we should vote as scheduled at a county level, moving ahead then with a renewed mandate.
There are many views on devolution but what is clear is that it’s an opportunity to make things more transparent and efficient for residents, let’s be ambitious for the outcome we in Rye and Winchelsea need and that ensures we are represented not in far away Lewes but closer to home in an Authority that values our unique communities.
Mike Wilkins makes a fair point about low turn out, but cancelling elections gives people yet another reason to believe their voices don’t matter. How will that improve turn out? This is the larger problem with our politics, that people continue to lose faith in it. Cancelling May’s elections prolongs the life of a minority Conservative administration at East Sussex CC. It’s a situation mirrored at Westminster, of course, where we have a majority government elected by a minority of the electorate. Labour’s ‘landslide’ was won by a mere 33.7% of the popular vote, the lowest of any majority party on record… So rather than cancelling county elections and removing locally-elected layers of district and borough governance, it might be more transformative to reform Westminster first and revive people’s general faith in democracy… I suspect there’s greater public support for that than for mayoral authorities. Also, as Stephen Holt avers in the article, threadbare local government finances and sustainment of crucial services must surely be one of the many more pressing priorities right now.
I agree that faith in democracy needs to be revived, but how can this happen? Unless we are careful then the shift towards popularism (arguably started by Cameron and his Brexit referendum thereby avoiding government responsibility to make hard decisions) will accelerate. We should be cherishing our form of representative democracy. I suggest that it be made compulsory to vote in elections, even if there is a ‘non of the above’ option included. All elections should be accompanied by information explaining our representative system. Many of our politicians also need to be either reminded or educated in our form of government, and it should be added the the school curriculum.
If nothing else, the one thing leaving the EU did was to make our politicians fully accountable to the electorate. For decades British Governments have been able to lay the blame at the EU’s door. Personally I believe leaving the EU was the best thing for our country. The issue is that our Politicians never wanted to leave. How is the EU economy doing and especially The EU powerhouse and number 1 funder Germany?.
You also mentioned Mike about making our voting system compulsory with a “None of the above ” option. What would happen if “None of the above” gained most of votes?.
Brighton & Hove City Council talking about wiping the multimillion debt owed on the failed i360. Of course this will have to be paid for by council tax payers. I wonder how residents of East Sussex feel about sharing the cost of covering the mismanagement and poor investment decisions of West Sussex?
What hope will there be for Eastern Rother when all financial decisions are made in Brighton?
I take on board all comments made, if authorities merge it will be at initial cost, but further into the future it could save a lot of money. My concern shared by others is the loss and ability for local peoples voice to be considerably reduced. If even listened to!
As to elections, either local or national, the issue of “trust” has been a major factor to resulting turnout. I agree that voting should be compulsory, that will also indicate who is here properly in the UK.
When I hear PMQ,s it tends to be a slanging match, not constructive, and the public must ask, have we really elected them, this is the case over many years. When we talk of cost cutting, much more would be saved if it was possible to have cross party agreement on major issues, eg. Health, transport, education, the future, eg retirement. All major issues that impact on our daily lives. Our economy is key, but stability and agreement helps in terms of investment. I fear none of these points will ever happen and that is why the general public have lost faith.It reflects on our young people also, we all need people to look up to, our elected MP,s fail on all counts, our young are concerned about their future as well. It is sad that our elected members have no gravitas when speaking, believe, gives hope for the future. Before any election the public need to know what the manifestos are, NOT has happened at this last general election. In the recent American election both contenders shared information, working together, with the intention of a good outcome, re Israel/Pallistine, if THEY can do it why can.t we???
It’s a really complicated question, but I think of it like this: First Past the Post created Farage and is fuelling the bad-tempered and polarised politics of disillusion. (As, of course is our fragmented media landscape, the spread of misinformation and the parlous state of our economy.) People are turning away from democratic participation bcs they know their voices don’t matter. Though both Labour and the Conservatives are deeply unpopular and losing support to Reform (Con 15%; Lab 5%) neither party wants to improve the stock of democracy by reforming our electoral system to make votes fair. They’d rather cling to the undemocratic advantage First Past the Post provides them. So for this, and other reasons, faith in democracy continues to decline and Reform continues to rise. The latest YouGov poll puts Reform at 25% support and pollsters Electoral Calculus project that if Reform win a 28% vote share at the next election, Farage could well be our PM. That’s where two party politics is leading us. Electoral reform won’t solve all our woes instantly, but it will be a damn good start. So will countenancing closer ties with our nearest trading partner – another positive step Lab/Con are reluctant to engage in for fear of losing votes to Reform.
As to the cancellation of the local elections, a cynical person might opine that Labour and the Conservatives’ interests align rather dismally at this moment. They’re both haemorrhaging support, and the last thing they want is a stark expression of that at the ballot box.
So, all things considered, I propose we focus on the iceberg(s), not the arrangement of the deckchairs…