We, the people of Essex, demand that Essex County Council withdraw their request to central government to postpone the May 2025 Essex County Council elections, whether this means withdrawing the request to be placed on the priority programme not. 

We recognise that the overarching process which the central government is initiating is non-negotiable and so needs to be engaged with, but it MUST be an engagement that has the wishes of ordinary Essex residents at its core. 

The last Essex County Council elections, where sitting Councillors were elected to represent their residents for a term of 4 years, took place in May 2021. By May 2025, this mandate will have expired meaning that County Councillors will be continuing in their roles without any mandate whatsoever. When we consider how much has changed locally, nationally, even globally in this time, these people cannot seriously expect that they can carry on in this role indefinitely without being granted a fresh democratic mandate to do so by the electorate.

The Conservatives and Labour both know how deeply unpopular they currently are across the country. To cancel the May elections allows them both to hide from this scrutiny as they know they would be bound to lose seats should the elections go ahead.  

The whole point of this process is to modernise the function and nature of Local Government. This can only be done by having Councillors with a true mandate from the people take this process forward. Therefore, we insist that the County Council elections must go ahead as planned.