No scheduled elections for Barnsley Council in May 2025

You may have seen a lot of press coverage and advertising campaigns around registering to vote and voting on 1 May 2025. However, there are no scheduled local elections in Barnsley this year due to the way our election cycles run.

Barnsley Council hold local elections by thirds. A third of the councillors are elected every year for three years, with no elections in the fourth year. 2025 is the fourth year in a cycle – otherwise known as the ‘fallow year’. This isn’t the result of a recent decision by the council or the government but stems from the way that local councils were set up under the Local Government Act 1972.

The last year that Barnsley should have had a fallow year was 2021 which was four years ago. However, all local elections in May 2020 were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic so these took place in 2021 instead. You can find information about our elections cycles on our webpage about different types of elections.

The next scheduled local council elections in Barnsley are due to take place on Thursday 7 May 2026. These will be ‘all-out’ local council elections where all 63 council seats will be contested. This is because of recent ward boundary changes following a review by the Local Government Boundary Commission. Details of that review and the new ward boundaries for Barnsley can be found on the Local Government Boundary Commission website.