What impact could 2026 council elections have?

Another year, and another set of elections for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough are scheduled. However, a late announcement at the end of the parliamentary term means they could be up in the air.

Local elections are due in May in South Cambridgeshire, Peterborough, Cambridge and Huntingdonshire.

However, because of local government reorganisation, Westminster announced in December that councils could request a postponement.

All four councils told the BBC they would be looking into it and making announcements in the new year. So, if the elections do go ahead in 2026, here is what we can expect.

The council is run by a Labour-led coalition with the Liberal Democrats and Peterborough First.

Labour is currently the largest party, but with only 14 councillors out of a possible 60, it needs the support of other parties.

The 18 seats scheduled to be contested this year were last fought in 2022. Back then, Labour won six of them. Any loss in support could mean it will not be the largest party in May.

In 2022, when elections were last held, Boris Johnson was the Conservative prime minister, although he was becoming unpopular and was facing calls to resign, which he did in July of that year.

That year, the Conservatives took seven of the 19 city council seats contested and remained the largest party, with 28 seats. But, over the next year or so, a number of Tory councillors defected to a new group, called Peterborough First.

This will be the first time some of those councillors will be up for re-election. Can they win under the Peterborough First branding?

Something else to consider is that Reform UK did not feature in the 2022 elections. It has been doing well in the polls recently and secured around a quarter of the mayoral vote in the city in 2025. Reform's efforts in the 2026 election campaign will be a new dimension to consider.

Cambridge has been run by Labour since 2014. It currently has a majority, with 23 seats out of a possible 42.

In May, 14 seats will be up for election, including the Newnham seat of leader Cameron Holloway. Labour is defending 11 seats. If it loses a small number of those, it could lose control of the administration.

The Liberal Democrats did well in last year's county council elections, taking six out of 12 seats, the Greens took three and Labour four.

The Conservative Party currently has one city council seat, won in a 2023 by-election. Reform has traditionally struggled to make ground in the city.

The Liberal Democrats have dominated the politics of South Cambs in recent years.

It has run the district council since 2018 and strengthened its numbers on the authority in 2022. Its only political opponent on the council at the moment is the Conservatives.

The Lib Dems won the Westminster seat in the 2024 general election and also won every seat in the South Cambs area in last years county council election.

The district has made national headlines after it decided to trial a four-day working week in 2023. The Liberal Democrats faced a lot of pushback from the Conservative-led government.

It issued the council with a "best value notice", asking it to provide evidence of the effectiveness of the controversial initiative. The notice was not renewed after Labour won the 2024 General Election.

But in October, the current government asked them to explain an apparent decline in housing services.

The Liberal Democrat administration said the policy, now permanent, has led to financial savings through better recruitment and retention.

The 2026 election will be the first time voters can show support for, or dissatisfaction with, the four-day working week. As well as the Conservatives, the Greens, Labour and Reform UK will also be trying to make their mark here.

Huntingdonshire had been a true-blue Conservative district for many years. That was until the 2022 election.

Despite winning the largest number of seats, the Tories did not secure enough for a majority and the party's leader, Ryan Fuller, lost his seat.

A so-called "rainbow coalition" was formed, with the Liberal Democrats, Labour, Independents and Greens all coming together to form an administration.

The Conservatives managed to retain the parliamentary seat of Huntingdon in 2024, but with a significantly reduced majority of less than 2,000.

If the party wants to show it is winning back core voters then this is a district it needs to win. But the threat from Reform is very real in some wards.

In the 2025 county council elections it won 3 seats in the Ramsey, Yaxley and St Neots areas.

Routine elections are not due this year at East Cambridgeshire District Council and Fenland District Council. They last elected full councils in 2023, so are due to hold elections in 2027.

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