Political correspondent
Senior political producer
In a conference suite on the fourth floor of Lancashire County Council’s headquarters, Joshua Roberts smiles as he is handed his new badge.
The 27-year-old’s photo ID includes his name and new title – Lancashire County Councillor – and hangs off a lanyard that’s coincidentally in the trademark turquoise of Reform UK.
Roberts runs a website and social media business and has never held elected office before, but now he’s one of 53 Reform councillors responsible for running services on behalf of more than 1.2 million people across Lancashire.
“I am new, but we’ve got experienced people too,” he said. “I’m glad we’re not all new because it would be very intimidating.
“We’ve had really good officers who have helped us. We’ve got experienced county councillors who’ve helped us as well. I feel at ease, I feel like we’re going to make real good change.”
Roberts and his colleagues were attending an induction day organised by council staff for newly elected councillors to get to grips with their roles.
As well as collecting their lanyards and being assigned IT login details, there were officers on hand to talk through some aspects of council services and how the authority works.
Having taken 53 of the council’s 84 seats the party has a significant majority.
It marks a big change for a council which had been led by the Conservatives since 2017, and which had been dominated by the Tories and Labour for decades before that.
While most of the newly elected have never been councillors before, there are some who bring experience – like Ged Mirfin, a Conservative councillor who switched to Reform UK six weeks before the elections.
“We’re getting very badly criticised at the moment for lacking political experience,” he said.
“But I’ve never seen a group of people who’ve had such a large amount of experience from the real world, the world of work.”
‘Hardened veterans’
Lancashire County Council is one of 10 local authorities that Reform UK won outright control of at the local elections.
Its performance in running the councils it now controls is being seen as a test of the party’s ability to govern.
The relatively new party has grown quickly, and there’s been a push to put infrastructure in place.
Following the local elections, more than 500 newly-elected councillors attended an event in London where a party source said they were “trained by hardened council veterans on how they can be the most effective champions for their local communities”.
Reform UK has been criticised for a lack of clarity about its plans for the councils it now runs.
The party’s leadership has signalled priorities will include reversing net zero initiatives and opposing diversity and inclusion policies.
Local authorities have little control over immigration, but Reform’s chairman Zia Yusuf has pledged to challenge the use of hotels to house migrants, while Nigel Farage has spoken of a “DOGE” for every council, referring to Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, set up in the US to root out waste.
In Lancashire, Cllr Stephen Atkinson is the council leader.
He’s one of Reform’s new councillors who does come with experience, having previously been the Conservative leader of Ribble Valley council before defecting.
Sitting in his office at the council’s headquarters in Preston, he said the party wanted to “look at every line in the budget” before making decisions.
“We need to look at the finances and understand what’s happening,” he said.
“We’re determined that this council will have a balanced budget. It will address some of the legacy issues such as special educational needs and development and adult social care.
“But we don’t want to get into how we are going to do that until we see how the money is.”
Lancashire County Council, like many authorities across England, has faced budget pressures with growing demand for adults and children services in particular.
These services are often statutory, which means a council has to provide them by law, and they make up a significant proportion of the council’s budget.
‘The wood from the trees’
Cllr Atkinson said: “Two thirds of the budget are on these legal services that you have to provide. That means there is one third that can be looked at… we’ve got to look at it and say if it helps residents great – if doesn’t, why are we doing it?
“That’s the advantage of Reform – it’s a fresh pair of eyes. We have 53 councillors of which 50 are new councillors.
“They can see the wood from the trees, they bring that challenge. We do that professionally and in a collaborative manner – but that is a mandate we have to do that.”
The party is conscious of the scrutiny it will face as the new kids on the political block, who’ve talked up their own chances of getting the keys to Downing Street in a matter of years.
Outside the first full meeting of Lancashire’s new-look council there were protests, with trade unionists among those holding banners and placards reading “refugees welcome” and “say no to Reform UK”, with speakers saying cutting “waste” would mean cutting services and jobs.
Asked about people who are worried about cuts, Cllr Atkinson said: “If it affects residents, we’ll try not to do it. It’s some of the other things that don’t affect residents.
“But this is all conditional on the spending review in June. I hope the government will treat Reform councils fairly.”
Inside the council chamber, the block of Reform councillors vastly outnumbered the other parties as they took their seats to go through the official process of appointing the leader and cabinet – which is made up of all men.
The Conservatives – who ran the council up until the elections in May – said so far there’s little policy detail about Reform’s plans.
Group leader Aidy Riggott said: “Businesses will be sat waiting and wondering, especially those in maybe the clean energy sector or the renewable sector, wondering if Lancashire’s a place where I can still invest my money.”
The independent and Green councillors who now make up the official opposition said they wanted to “hold Reform to account”.
Independent councillor Almas Razakazi added: “My ward is very impoverished. It’s full of different nationalities, and lots of people who are immigrants and they put a lot into the economy, so I want to make sure they are properly represented and treated fairly.”
It is early days for Reform in power, and in Lancashire the party is keen to stress they want to work with officers from the council to take time before making policy decisions.
The challenge is now whether the party can deliver on what they’ve promised – something many political parties have found is easier said than done.
