Lots to lose and prove on 1 May

Conservative-run since 2009, all 62 of Staffordshire’s county council seats will be contested on 1 May.

The Tories had landslide success in the last two local elections. In 2021, the party took more than half the votes and a whopping 57 seats.

For Labour, despite gaining seats in the General Election, they start from a low base in Staffordshire, and it has proved challenging territory for the Liberal Democrats and Green party, each fielding candidates in most wards.

Alongside these parties, for the first time voters will see Reform UK on every ballot paper. Nigel Farage’s party hopes to capitalise on the General Election when it took almost a quarter of the vote in some parts of the county.

Reform, then, has a lot to prove. Will it win in towns such as Cannock, Tamworth, Burton and Leek, or will the party simply peel away votes from the Tories, potentially landing it third place?

The Conservatives, meanwhile, that dominant force for years in Staffordshire, have a lot to lose.

As for people living in the county, their council tax bill has gone up by 4.99% this year, with the authority, like many others, under increasing pressure to balance its budget.

The council spends two thirds of its income on social care.

Former Stafford MP Jeremy Lefroy is the Conservative candidate for the Audley and Chesterton ward. When asked why he was returning to politics, he said he had never stepped away, just stepped down from parliament, to spend more time at home in Staffordshire.

He said his priorities if he won were:

• To focus on the local economy, seeing what could be done to bring more jobs, and better paid jobs, into the area

• To put more resources into tackling the state of the roads, both the potholes and the road surfaces.

Aaron Thurstance, standing in Stafford South West for Labour and Co-operative group, said he was not happy with the way things were run, and that he did not want to “scream from the sidelines, but play a part in fixing things”, including:

• Using government money to tie up planning issues and repair more potholes

• Tackling anti-social behaviour, giving children opportunities in Stafford following cuts to youth services.

Sean Bagguley represents Reform. He described feelings of frustration looking from the outside in, and said in his opinion, the two main parties were, at local level, “running the councils to the ground”. If he won in Stone Rural North, he said he would:

• Sort potholes, bringing in experts and people who did it in a cost-effective manner

• Audit “the hell out of these councils”, because “we’re paying a lot of council tax, and there is huge amounts of waste”.

Hoping to gain the Liberal Democrats’ first ever county council seat is Alec Sandiford, who is also a Stafford borough councillor. He feels the things people care about aren’t being addressed, and says he will:

• Work hard to tackle the issue you care about most, including the state of the roads and pavements

• Bring services more in-house to fix potholes.

Jack Rose is standing for the Green party. He is also an elected borough councillor who is now campaigning for representation on the county in the Stafford West and Rural division.

He said if he won he would:

• Fine contractors carrying out repair work on the roads if filled-in potholes re-appeared within six months

• Try to improve local transport links.