Districts Poll April 2021

This page first posted 4 May 2021, revised 5 May 2021

Pollster Find Out Now and election experts Electoral Calculus have run a MRP poll on the upcoming English district council elections on 6 May 2021.

The poll asked residents of the 123 district councils up for election, whether and how they intended toleratevote on Thursday. (Note the Isles of Scilly council is excluded, as national parties do not contest it.)

The headline voting intention for these council areas is

Party	Share of vote (pc)
CON	30
LAB	38
LIB	13
Reform	3
Green	8
Independent/Other	8

The fact that Labour are ahead in the vote share is expected, since many of the councils are traditional Labour areas in the north of England and Labour already holds more of these councils than the Conservatives.

Predicted Council Results

The predicted results are shown in the map below and the summary table. Detailed results are at the bottom of this page.

Predicted District Council Results May 2021

The number of councils predicted to be controlled by each party is shown in the next table.

Party in Control of Council	Current Number of Councils	Predicted Number of Councils	Predicted Change
CON	27	39	12
LAB	52	54	2
LIB	6	7	1
Reform	0	0	0
Green	0	0	0
Independent	1	0	-1
NOC / Coalition	37	23	-14
Total	123	123	0

The prediction is that both the Conservatives and Labour will gain councils from 'No overall control', though the Conservatives are likely to gain more.

This would be a good result for the Conservatives given the recent sleaze allegations.

In terms of the number of wards won, the prediction is:

Party	Current Wards	Predicted Wards	Predicted Change
CON	1,844	2,183	339
LAB	2,749	3,029	280
LIB	851	754	-97
Reform	11	3	-8
Green	106	98	-8
Independent/Other	567	364	-203
Vacant	162	110	-52
Total	6,290	6,541	251

Note the number of wards has increased by around 250 because of the newly created unitary councils of Buckinghamshire, North Northamptonshire and West Northamptonshire.

The figures show that the Conservatives and Labour are both predicted to gain seats, with the Liberal Democrats and Independents predicted to lose some seats. Again, the fact that the Conservatives are gaining a similar number of seats to Labour should be encouraging for them. As we approach the parliamentary mid-term, the governing party often starts to suffer electoral losses.

Councils Predicted to Change Hands

Conservative gains:

from Labour: Amber Valley
from 'No Overall Control': Basildon, Cannock Chase, Crawley, Dudley, Gloucester, Nuneaton and Bedworth
new council boundaries: Buckinghamshire, Cornwall, North Northamptonshire, Pendle, West Northamptonshire

Labour gains:

from 'No Overall Control': Bristol, Burnley, Wirral
new council boundaries: Hartlepool

Liberal Democrat gains:

from 'No Overall Control': St Albans

Councils switching to 'No Overall Control':

From LAB: Harlow

Predicting councils with new boundaries can be difficult because voters have not had the chance of voting in those new wards before, and local voting patterns may vary. In particular, Cornwall, Hartlepool, and Basingstoke and Deane are not certain predictions and may behave idiosyncratically.

Additionally, Adur council is quite marginal are could easily go the other way.

The predictions show that the Conservatives might gain a council directly from Labour, while Labour gains no councils directly from the Conservatives. If that transpires, it would be a good result for the Conservatives.

The Conservatives are also predicted to gain some councils in the Midlands (such as Cannock Chase, Dudley, and Nuneaton and Bedworth) which is encouraging for them. But they are not making further inroads into the 'Red Wall' of northern England.

Commentary

Chris Holbrook, CEO of Find Out Now said "Our polling suggests that recent controversies surrounding the Prime Minister haven't changed voting intention, or at least it hasn't reached a tipping point yet. If further stories develop, there may be only so much that the Conservatives' newest constituents will tolerate."

Martin Baxter, CEO of Electoral Calculus: "Labour look like missing an opportunity to make real electoral progress, and the Conservatives have successfully steadied their ship. That would deprive Labour of some political momentum, and bring relief to the government."

Full List of Councils

This table shows current and predicted controlling party in each of the 123 English district councils up for election (excluding Isles of Scilly).

NOC = 'No overall control': no party has an absolute majority

District	Current	Predicted	Comments
Adur	NOC	NOC	Marginal – could go either way
Amber Valley	LAB	CON
Barnsley	LAB	LAB
Basildon	NOC	CON
Basingstoke and Deane	NOC	NOC	New boundaries – prediction uncertain
Blackburn with Darwen	LAB	LAB
Bolton	NOC	NOC
Bradford	LAB	LAB
Brentwood	CON	CON
Bristol	NOC	LAB
Broxbourne	CON	CON
Buckinghamshire	NOC	CON	New local authority
Burnley	NOC	LAB
Bury	LAB	LAB
Calderdale	LAB	LAB
Cambridge	LAB	LAB	New boundaries
Cannock Chase	NOC	CON
Castle Point	CON	CON
Cheltenham	LIB	LIB
Cherwell	CON	CON
Chorley	LAB	LAB	New boundaries
Colchester	NOC	NOC
Cornwall	NOC	CON	New boundaries – prediction uncertain
Coventry	LAB	LAB
Crawley	NOC	CON
Derby	NOC	NOC
Doncaster	LAB	LAB
Dudley	NOC	CON
Durham	LAB	LAB
Eastleigh	LIB	LIB
Elmbridge	NOC	NOC
Epping Forest	CON	CON
Exeter	LAB	LAB
Fareham	CON	CON
Gateshead	LAB	LAB
Gloucester	NOC	CON
Gosport	CON	CON
Halton	LAB	LAB	New boundaries
Harlow	LAB	NOC
Hart	NOC	NOC
Hartlepool	OTH	LAB	New boundaries – prediction uncertain
Hastings	LAB	LAB
Havant	CON	CON
Hyndburn	LAB	LAB
Ipswich	LAB	LAB
Isle of Wight	CON	CON	New boundaries
Kingston upon Hull	LAB	LAB
Kirklees	NOC	NOC
Knowsley	LAB	LAB
Leeds	LAB	LAB
Lincoln	LAB	LAB
Liverpool	LAB	LAB
Maidstone	NOC	NOC
Manchester	LAB	LAB
Milton Keynes	NOC	NOC
Mole Valley	LIB	LIB
Newcastle upon Tyne	LAB	LAB
North East Lincolnshire	CON	CON
North Hertfordshire	NOC	NOC
North Northamptonshire	NOC	CON	New local authority
North Tyneside	LAB	LAB
Northumberland	NOC	NOC
Norwich	LAB	LAB
Nuneaton and Bedworth	NOC	CON
Oldham	LAB	LAB
Oxford	LAB	LAB	New boundaries
Pendle	NOC	CON	New boundaries
Peterborough	NOC	NOC
Plymouth	LAB	LAB
Portsmouth	NOC	NOC
Preston	LAB	LAB
Reading	LAB	LAB
Redditch	CON	CON
Reigate and Banstead	CON	CON
Rochdale	LAB	LAB
Rochford	CON	CON
Rossendale	LAB	LAB
Rotherham	LAB	LAB	New boundaries
Rugby	CON	CON
Runnymede	CON	CON
Rushmoor	CON	CON
Salford	LAB	LAB	New boundaries
Sandwell	LAB	LAB
Sefton	LAB	LAB
Sheffield	LAB	LAB
Shropshire	CON	CON
Slough	LAB	LAB
Solihull	CON	CON
South Tyneside	LAB	LAB
Southampton	LAB	LAB
Southend-on-Sea	NOC	NOC
St Albans	NOC	LIB
St Helens	LAB	LAB
Stevenage	LAB	LAB
Stockport	NOC	NOC
Stroud	NOC	NOC	New boundaries – prediction uncertain
Sunderland	LAB	LAB
Swindon	CON	CON
Tameside	LAB	LAB
Tamworth	CON	CON
Tandridge	NOC	NOC
Three Rivers	LIB	LIB
Thurrock	CON	CON
Trafford	LAB	LAB
Tunbridge Wells	CON	CON
Wakefield	LAB	LAB
Walsall	CON	CON
Warrington	LAB	LAB
Watford	LIB	LIB
Welwyn Hatfield	NOC	NOC
West Lancashire	LAB	LAB
West Northamptonshire	NOC	CON	New local authority
West Oxfordshire	CON	CON
Wigan	LAB	LAB
Wiltshire	CON	CON	New boundaries
Winchester	LIB	LIB
Wirral	NOC	LAB
Woking	NOC	NOC
Wokingham	CON	CON
Wolverhampton	LAB	LAB
Worcester	NOC	NOC
Worthing	CON	CON
Wyre Forest	NOC	NOC

Fieldwork

Find Out Now polled 11,506 residents of 123 English district councils online between 27-28 April 2021. The sample was weighted to be representative by gender, age, social grade and past voting patterns. Regression techniques were used to infer ward and council results.

Find Out Now is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules.