Council shake-up paused as government launches review
Council leaders in Staffordshire have told the government to ‘stop wasting our time and energy’, after ministers pressed pause on plans to streamline local government.
Local government secretary Angela Rayner said she was reviewing council reorganisation proposals which would have included the abolition of two-tier local authorities in five Midlands regions, to ensure they were legally sound.
The planned shake-up includes the expansion of city administrations in Nottingham, Leicester and Derby, as well as the proposed merger of councils in north and south Staffordshire to create two super-sized unitary authorities to run the county.
Those plans have now gone on ice while a review takes place, with local elections due to be held in May 2027 set to go ahead using existing boundaries. Local government reorganisations in Essex, Hampshire, Norfolk, and Suffolk have been withdrawn completely and will go back to square one.
In a statement, Rayner said the review would ensure the process was “robust”, and aligned with the new government’s wider devolution plans.
The move comes after several local authorities said they were considering mounting a legal challenge over the proposals, including Leicestershire County Council and vocal opponents of the reorganisation, Newcastle-under-Lyme.
Newcastle leader, Cllr Jonathan Gullis, said the decision was a “major moment for Newcastle-under-Lyme”, while fellow Reform-led Staffordshire County Council criticised the decision to delay the reorganisation.
In a statement, council leader Cllr Martin Murray described the move as an “eleventh-hour decision”, made with “little warning and even less detail.”
“Councils across Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent have worked flat out to meet Government’s timetable, following their rules. To pause now wastes time, drains capacity and undermines confidence,” he said.
“The timetable is broken. Government must stop wasting our time and energy, give councils straight answers and put devolution first.
“Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent need a strategic authority, a stronger voice and the power to make decisions locally. We will keep pressing for that.”
As part of plans announced in the 2024 English devolution white paper, the government wants all areas to adopt larger unitary authorities in place of more traditional county council arrangements, which see services delivered by a combination of county and parish level councils.
The move had caused widespread concern among those councils due to be merged or disbanded, with Leicestershire due to consider plans for the first stages of a legal challenge at its meeting later this evening.
A spokesperson for the Local Government Association, which represents councils, said: “Councils across the country will hold different views on the local government reorganisation (LGR) programme, for what it means for their areas, and the announcement of today’s review. But there is no excuse for the Government’s mishandling of this process.
“Today’s announcement, however, will have caused significant uncertainty, after councils have invested scarce public money and countless hours in the government’s LGR programme. People’s jobs, lives and wider commitments have been affected. Staff, councillors and their families cannot be expected to put their lives on hold while ministers undertake a review which is a mess of their own making. Particularly at a time when local services remain under real pressure, this is no way to treat local government.
“Councils need certainty to plan how to deliver vital services to residents and meet demand pressures, and, as we said in July, their expert view needs to be embedded in LGR decision-making. Ministers must now set a clear timetable and ensure councils are not left to pick up the bill.”
The full list of paused reorganisation areas is as follows;
- Derby and Derbyshire
- Devon, Plymouth and Torbay
- East Sussex and Brighton
- Gloucestershire
- Hertfordshire
- Kent and Medway
- Lancashire, Blackburn with Darwen and Blackpool
- Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland
- Lincolnshire, North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire
- Nottingham and Nottinghamshire
- Oxfordshire and West Berkshire
- Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent
- Warwickshire
- Worcestershire
