If you have the opportunity to vote on 7 May 2026, we’re suggesting that you try to make your vote really count by engaging with local parties to tell them why you are or aren’t supporting them.
In spite of 29 of the 63 local elections being cancelled, there will still be:
- local government elections
- Scottish Parliament elections
- Senedd Cymru elections
- mayoral elections in England
taking place.
To find out if there is an election you can vote in, type your postcode into the Electoral Commission website.
We think it’s vital that you do vote if you can, but we also think it’s really valuable to contact local political party offices and tell them why you are, or are not, going to vote for them.
This especially matters if you are not planning to vote Labour, given that they are the current party of government. Because if Labour do very badly in the May elections there’s a real possibility they will consider a change of direction.
The problem is that MPs on the right of the Labour party will argue that the party should move further right to achieve better results – which will include more of a crackdown on welfare - while those on the left will argue for a move to the left. Many centrist MPs will have no clue what is best.
So, we think readers who intend not to vote Labour because of the party’s benefits policies should tell their local Labour party that this is the case. That way, there will be some actual evidence of why people voted the way they did.
Equally, if you intend not to vote for other parties because of their benefits policies, tell them that. So, if you are disgusted with the rhetoric coming from Reform and the Conservatives, for example, contact their local office and tell them so.
For some parties, it’s easy to find local party office contact details, others are not so easy.
To try to help, we’ve put together instructions on how to contact each party’s local office on our What you can do page - look under “Contact your local political parties”.
If you do contact any local parties, please consider sharing what you sent – and any replies you received – in the comments below.
