All you need to know as Essex heads into a big round of elections

The biggest set of council elections since 2021 is set to take place across Essex on 7 May.

The county is so often seen as a national barometer of public opinion, and local authorities could change hands this year between political parties.

Nearly 1.4 million people across Essex will have a chance to vote for their local representative.

So which councils are up and how do people have their say?

In short: there are elections pretty much everywhere.

Voting for Essex County Council was postponed last year. The boundaries have changed since they were last contested in 2021 and there are three extra council seats.

All 78 seats are up, meaning any party, or parties, could form an administration and run one of the biggest councils in England.

Two thirds of its £1.2bn spending goes on social care and children's services. The authority also fixes potholes, runs libraries and deals with waste management.

As does Thurrock Council, where every seat is up, and Southend City Council, where a third of seats are being contested.

These two councils are unitary, which means they also provide the same services as district councils, such as street cleaning, collecting waste, housing, planning, parks and local leisure facilities.

Six district councils have a third of their seats up, one in every ward of: Basildon, Brentwood, Epping Forest, Harlow, Rochford and Colchester. Voters here will get one ballot paper for the county and another for their district council.

These are local elections to choose people to deal with the services mentioned above.

But they will be a big test for the main parties as we head towards the halfway point between the last general election and the next.

Essex has two national party leaders as MPs: Conservative Kemi Badenoch and Reform UK's Nigel Farage. It will be a test for these two in their backyards.

The county council has been run by the Conservatives since 2021. But this year there is an expectation that Reform will make significant gains and could get a majority.

The Conservatives admit they are on the defensive and it will be a tough set of elections. As do Labour, who are defending fewer seats in Essex.

The Liberal Democrats and Greens appear confident to make gains too. Independents have also performed well across Essex over the past decade.

Thurrock council is currently run with a Labour majority but it has been run by the Conservatives in the past and was three-way split with UKIP a decade ago. Again, Farage's party is targeting this council.

With a third of seats up at the other councils, it is harder for another party to win outright control. But a change of parties in a coalition or a new minority administration is possible.

This is the current political control:

• Basildon - Labour with Independents
• Brentwood - Liberal Democrat with Labour
• Colchester City Council - Liberal Democrat with Labour
• Epping Forest District Council - Conservative
• Harlow - Conservative
• Rochford - Conservative with Rochford District Residents' Group and Rochford and Foulness Wakering Independents Group
• Southend - Labour with Independents and Liberal Democrats

• 9 April - Close of nominations for people to stand in May's elections
• 20 April - Deadline to register to vote, which can be done online
• 21 April - Deadline to apply for a postal vote, which can also be done online.
• 28 April - Deadline to apply for a proxy vote, where you can name someone to vote on your behalf. It is also the deadline to apply for a voter authority certificate if you do not have ID like a driver's licence or passport. You need to show ID at a polling station to be able to vote
• 7 May - Polling stations open at 0700 and close at 2200. If you are in the queue by 22:00, you will be able to vote but do not forget your ID

Most of the time, polling stations are in churches, community centres and schools but there are some quirky ones in Essex. Four pubs are being used.

The Three Pigeons in Halstead, Red Lion in Belchamp Otten, the Eight Bells in Bures Hamlet and the function room of the Three Horseshoes in Duton Hill will all have polling stations. With polls opening at 07:00, the bar may not be open the same hours!

In Saffron Walden, an indoor bowling alley is being used and Little Bardfield's cricket pavilion will be hosting the local polling station.

We will find out the results, at the latest, in the afternoon of Friday, 8 May.

A number of councils are counting immediately after the polls close at 22:00 on Thursday. So, the first results will start coming in just after midnight.

By the time you wake up Friday we will have an idea of how the political parties have done.

But some councils like Thurrock will be counting during the day on Friday, so we will not know the full results until the afternoon.

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