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About the May 2023 local elections

Elections were held in 230 councils in England on 4 May 2023. There were elections in 152 district councils, 32 metropolitan district councils, and 46 unitary authorities. Seven in ten English voters were eligible to vote in these elections. Across England, elections were held for 8,077 seats across around 4,800 wards. There were also four mayoral elections, last contested in 2019.

Download the Local Elections Handbook 2023 and the dataset below for figures and analysis of the May 2023 local elections results.

For a summary of the results, see the Commons Library briefing on the 2023 local elections.

Documents to download

About the Local Elections Handbook 2023

Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, directors of the Elections Centre, have published their Local Elections Handbook 2023 in collaboration with the Commons Library. Along with the handbook containing figures and analysis of the May 2023 local elections results, the authors have also released a comprehensive dataset.

In the dataset you will find and be able to analyse voting results across all English electoral districts and wards, including ward voting turnout, number of vacancies per ward, candidate party affiliation, votes collected per candidate, final outcomes for wards and candidates, and more.

The dataset also presents results for parties and their candidates and can be used to further examine party success in individual counties and districts. The data was sourced from local authority websites and through correspondence with local authorities.

This work follows on from the publication of the Local Elections Handbook and dataset for the 2022 local elections and Local Elections Handbook and dataset for the 2021 local elections.

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