Reading’s local elections are going ahead amid widespread uncertainty about scheduled votes elsewhere in the country.
Local government is currently undergoing an overhaul driven by the Labour government that will abolish the ‘two‑tier’ system of county and district councils in favour of unitary authorities.
All six councils in Berkshire have been unitary authorities since Berkshire County Council was abolished in 1998, so there will be no delays to elections scheduled here this year.
Councils run elections either as all‑out contests every four years, or ‘by thirds’ where a third of councillors are elected each year. That system creates a ‘fallow year’ with no polls to allow councillors to serve four‑year terms.
Reading Borough Council and Wokingham Borough Council both use the ‘by thirds’ system and had a ‘fallow year’ in 2025. That meant there were no elections in either place last year, with elections resuming this May.
The other four Berkshire councils — West Berkshire, Bracknell Forest, the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, and Slough — hold all‑out elections every four years.
There had been concern nationally that some local elections would be cancelled because of the reorganisation. Of 63 councils undergoing change, 30 that were due to have elections were set to have them cancelled by the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government.
Reform UK successfully legally challenged those cancellations, meaning the elections will go ahead on Thursday, May 7. Nigel Farage, Reform UK MP for Clacton and the party leader, posted on X/Twitter: “We took this Labour government to court and won.”
Confirming the decision to go ahead, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Local Government said: “Following legal advice, the Government has withdrawn its original decision to postpone 30 local elections in May. “Providing certainty to councils about their local elections is now the most crucial thing and all local elections will now go ahead in May 2026.”
Of Berkshire councils, only West Berkshire is potentially affected by the current reorganisation proposals. Its Liberal Democrat controlled council has offered to join South Oxfordshire and the Vale of White Horse to create a Ridgeway Council unitary authority as part of the Oxfordshire reorganisation; a public consultation on three options is currently live.
The last elections for Reading and Wokingham took place in 2024, while West Berkshire had its all‑out election in 2023. Buckinghamshire and Somerset councils were already turned into unitary councils in 2020 and 2023, respectively.
James Aldridge, Local Democracy Reporter
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