Here is why, while the rest of the country was turning up at the ballots to vote for council representatives, residents of Greater Manchester stayed home.
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00:00Hello and welcome to Manchester World on what is a lovely day here in Manchester.
00:04My name is Theo Heusenbetz and today we're going to be talking about local elections.
00:08That's because much of the focus in the news and in a lot of cities this week
00:12will be on the local elections that took place this week on Thursday, May 1st
00:16when residents had the chance to choose councillors to represent them on local councils.
00:20Now, councillors can have a substantial impact on local policies,
00:24stuff like planning permissions, and they're quite a big deal for towns and cities across the UK
00:29because, as I say, not only do they impact council policy in general,
00:33but they can lead to changes of strategy when it comes to local planning,
00:36when it comes to bin collections, and stuff like protection of local environments.
00:40But it can allow people to express their views on countrywide politics
00:43as well as impacting these local policies.
00:46However, while much of the country has had to contend with these issues and come to a decision,
00:50here in Greater Manchester it's not been a problem.
00:52And this is because council wards are usually represented by three councillors
00:56and they're elected in a staggered manner,
00:58meaning that a new election occurs each year to replace one of the councillors.
01:03What this means is that for one year out of every four,
01:05there's something called a fallow year,
01:07which means that no elections take place at all.
01:09And that has been the case across the majority of the region this year.
01:13Now, the next year we'll see a number of elections,
01:16but the thing to remember is that 2024 was remarkably busy.
01:19We had, obviously, a general election, we had council elections too,
01:22and mayoral elections all took place.
01:24So, next year we'll see local elections across Greater Manchester
01:28with the same following in 2027 and 2028,
01:31with 2028 also being the time that the next mayoral election will take place
01:35with Andy Burnham winning convincingly last time out.
01:38So, let us know what you're looking ahead to having your say in.
01:41But that's all for now.
01:42Thank you very much for watching Manchester World,
01:44and we'll see you again soon.