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1997 United Kingdom local elections

← 1996 1 May 1997 (England) 21 May 1997 (Northern Ireland) 1998 →
All 34 non-metropolitan counties, 21 out of 46 unitary authorities, 1 out of 238 English districts, 1 sui generis authority and all 26 Northern Irish districts
Majority party Minority party Third party   Leader Tony Blair John Major Paddy Ashdown Party Labour Conservative Liberal Democrats Leader since 21 July 1994 27 November 1990 16 July 1988 Councillors 1,299 1,121 741 Councillors +/- 1 193 177
Colours denote the winning party, as shown in the main table of results.

The 1997 United Kingdom local elections took place on Thursday 1 May 1997 in England, and Wednesday 21 May 1997 in Northern Ireland. Elections took place for all of the English country councils, some English unitary authorities and all of the Northern Ireland districts. The local elections were held on the same day as the 1997 general election.

Summary of results

While the results were overshadowed by the landslide election of a Labour government, they did provide some comfort to the Conservative party. The Conservatives made some gains and were the largest party in the county council elections. It is likely that what helped the Conservatives gain some councils (Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Essex and Kent) was the creation of unitary authorities and thus the abolition of county council divisions in these areas (in this case unitaries in Peterborough, Luton, Thurrock and Medway), in predominantly urbanised areas which are usually strong for the Labour Party in elections and indeed all four of those unitaries (and all of the parliamentary seats that they cover) were won/held by Labour at the point these elections took place. Buckinghamshire, the only county council that the Conservatives actually had a majority for the four years prior to these elections, will have also been helped by the creation of a unitary authority for Milton Keynes in 1996.

The gains for the Conservatives in Lincolnshire, Surrey and West Sussex will likely have been helped by the fact that most parliamentary seats in these counties were seriously strong Conservative areas (indeed, every parliamentary seat in Surrey was retained by the Conservatives in the general election) and thus saw some genuine ground recovered compared with the 1993 local elections. The only seats that the Conservatives lost in the general election in these areas were Lincoln and Crawley, both of which were very easy seats for Labour to gain in the general election, while they came close to losing Boston & Skegness to Labour too, though this was far from enough to have made a difference to council control in their respective counties.

England

Non-metropolitan county councils

In 34 non-metropolitan counties the whole council was up for election.

† Elected as a "shadow authority" until 1 April 1998.

‡ Because areas of the county were due to become unitary authorities on 1 April 1998, the county councillors representing those areas had their terms extended by one year and no election was held.

Unitary authorities

Whole council

These were the first elections to 19 more unitary authorities established by the Local Government Commission for England (1992). They acted as "shadow authorities" until 1 April 1998.

‡ New ward boundaries from predecessor authorities

Third of council

In 2 unitary authorities one third of the council was up for election.

District council

In 1 district the whole council was up for election.

‡ New ward boundaries

Sui generis

Northern Ireland

References

1. Rallings, Colin; Thrasher, Michael. Local Elections Handbook 1997 (PDF). Local Government Chronicle Elections Centre. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
2. "Council compositions". The Elections Centre. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
3. "Local Elections of 1 May 1997 - Parliament.uk" (PDF). researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/. Parliament UK. 27 June 1997. Retrieved 3 May 2019.

• Local election results 1997
• The local elections of 1 May 1997. House of Commons Library Research Paper 97/82.
• Vote 1999 BBC News
• Vote 2001 BBC News

v t e (1996 ←) 1997 United Kingdom local elections (→ 1998)
County councils	Bedfordshire Buckinghamshire Cambridgeshire Cheshire Cornwall Cumbria Derbyshire Devon Dorset Durham East Sussex Essex Gloucestershire Hampshire Hertfordshire Kent Lancashire Leicestershire Lincolnshire Norfolk North Yorkshire Northamptonshire Northumberland Nottinghamshire Oxfordshire Shropshire Somerset Staffordshire Suffolk Surrey Warwickshire West Sussex Wiltshire Worcestershire
Unitary authorities	Blackburn with Darwen Blackpool Bracknell Forest Bristol Halton Herefordshire Hull Medway Nottingham Peterborough Plymouth Reading Slough Southend-on-Sea Telford and Wrekin Thurrock Torbay Warrington West Berkshire Windsor and Maidenhead Wokingham
District councils (England)	Malvern Hills
District councils (Northern Ireland)	Antrim Ards Armagh Ballymena Ballymoney Banbridge Belfast Carrickfergus Castlereagh Coleraine Cookstown Craigavon Derry Down Dungannon Fermanagh Larne Limavady Lisburn Magherafelt Moyle Newry and Mourne Newtownabbey North Down Omagh Strabane
Sui generis	Isles of Scilly
Referendums	Scottish devolution Welsh devolution
See also: UK General election

v t e Elections and referendums in the United Kingdom
General elections	1802 1806 1807 1812 1818 1820 1826 1830 1831 1832 1835 1837 1841 1847 1852 1857 1859 1865 1868 1874 1880 1885 1886 1892 1895 1900 1906 1910 (Jan) 1910 (Dec) 1918 1922 1923 1924 1929 1931 1935 1945 1950 1951 1955 1959 1964 1966 1970 1974 (Feb) 1974 (Oct) 1979 1983 1987 1992 1997 2001 2005 2010 2015 2017 2019 2024 Next
Local elections	1889 1890 1892 1894 1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1945 1946 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
European elections	1979 1984 1989 1994 1999 2004 2009 2014 2019
Referendums	1975 2011 2016
See also Elections in England Northern Ireland Scotland Wales Great Britain

• 1997 United Kingdom local elections
• Council elections in the United Kingdom
• 1997 elections in the United Kingdom
• Tony Blair