British voters are in for a relatively untroubled 2025, after the “Year of Elections” which saw a new government in the UK and major upheavals around the world, including the victory of Donald Trump, who will be inaugurated as US president for the second time on 20 January.

In all likelihood, Sir Keir Starmer needs not go to the polls for some four and a half years, thanks to the huge Commons majority Labour won last July.

August 2029 is the deadline for the next UK general election, by which time the second Trump administration will have been and gone.

The next elections for the Scottish parliament and the assemblies in Wales and Northern Ireland are not due until 27 May 2026.

All of which means slim pickings for those trying to glean the political mood of the UK and a much greater focus than usual this year on what little voting is due to take place: English councils on 1 May. Making detailed sense of the picture will be a tough task for two vital reasons.

Comparisons with the last local elections in the same places in May 2021 will be tricky because the government’s English Devolution Bill has given some areas the chance to opt out of elections this year if they are likely to become part of the proposed combined single-tier “Strategic Authorities”.

Secondly, in 2021 the state of the parties in contention was very different. There was no Reform UK party, and none of its predecessor Brexit or UKIP parties to speak of. Boris Johnson’s Conservatives were riding high. The Tories made big gains at council level, while Labour, Liberal Democrats and Greens stalled.

The political map has been transformed since then. Today there are five Reform UK MPs at Westminster, four Greens and a record 72 Liberal Democrats.

The standard question in opinion polls is: “How would you vote if there were to be a general election tomorrow?”.

We all know there is not going to be one for years.

Besides, as beleaguered politicians always like to point out when the news is bad, even when one was imminent in 2024, the polls did not precisely reflect what happened with “real votes in real ballot boxes”.

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Picture is not cheering for established parties

What the polls do give is a broad indication of the trend in opinion, and the picture is not cheering for the established parties.

Labour and the Conservatives are neck-and-neck in the mid-20% range, an astonishingly low level of support for either of them.

Reform UK is only about five points behind, clearly the current third force in British politics and well up on their 14% at the general election.

The Liberal Democrats, at around 12% and the Greens at 6% are more or less holding their vote share.

Can Reform and Farage keep up momentum?

The big question in the 2025 local elections is whether Reform UK and its leader Nigel Farage can keep up their momentum.

On the face of it the party seems well placed to make a splash. Because it is starting from zero – any council seats it wins will count as gains.

Reform UK has reorganised since the general election and is now trying to establish a competitive grassroots operation.

Funding does not seem to be a problem. Zia Yusuf, a multi-millionaire former Goldman Sachs banker, has taken over as party chairman.

The property magnate Nick Candy, Reform UK’s new treasurer, was in the group that met Elon Musk at Mr Trump’s Mar-e-Largo headquarters. Afterwards Mr Farage downplayed reports Mr Musk might be prepared to donate as much as $100m (£79m) to his party.

Reform is splitting the right-of-centre vote

Reform UK claimed last week to have several thousand more members registered than the Conservative Party’s official figure of 131,680 – a ticker on their official website is keeping count.

The party is currently splitting the vote on the right of centre with the Conservative Party as its prime target. The strong Tory performance in these areas last time leaves them looking highly vulnerable.

In 2021, the Conservatives won control of 19 out of 21 county councils and seven of 13 unitary authorities. In subsequent local elections in other areas the Conservatives suffered heavy losses, meaning overall they are now behind Labour for the total number of councillors. This year the Tories are defending their last remaining electoral high point.

Tories don’t know whether to fight or accommodate Reform

Mr Farage is the outstanding communicator active in British politics, who has frequently exploited non-Westminster elections to exert pressure on the UK government, most notably in the 2014 and 2019 European elections, when strong performances drove the Conservatives first to the EU membership referendum and then to a hard Brexit.

The Conservatives do not know whether to fight or try to accommodate Reform UK.

Should Reform hammer them in this year’s council elections, it could be the end for Kemi Badenoch’s leadership. In the longer run it is conceivable Reform could supplant the Conservatives – or take them over by merger – as the main political force on the right of British politics.

Reform also targeting Labour voters

There is also a Reform UK threat to Labour as well.

So far Labour has dominated the new strategic mayoralities and combined authorities in England. They currently hold all four of those up for election in May 2025: West of England, Cambridgeshire, Doncaster and North Tyneside. Two more mayors are being voted for this year in Greater Lincolnshire and Hull and East Yorkshire.

While socially right-wing, Reform UK is tailoring its economic message to the less well-off, including to populations in the so-called “Red Wall”, de-industrialised areas of the country which were once safe Labour constituencies. For example, Dame Andrea Jenkyns, the former Conservative MP and minister, is now Reform’s candidate to be the new mayor of Greater Lincolnshire.

Unlike the two main parties, Reform has a straightforward policy on the threatened Scunthorpe steelworks – nationalise it. It has obvious appeal even though there is no chance Dame Andrea could enact it.

A disappointment for Farage would not be the end of the insurgency

Voters are more inclined to vote with their hearts when the national government is not at issue. One of Sir Keir’s nightmares must be that the devolution this government is spreading across England starts to light up in colours other than red.

It is certainly possible this year’s council election results could be a major disappointment for Mr Farage’s party. If so it will not be the end of the insurgency. Reform UK is already also making plans to inflict damage on Conservatives, Labour and SNP alike in the next set of non-Westminster elections, in 2027, in Scotland and Wales.

2025’s comparatively minor elections are set to have major political consequences at the very least for Mr Farage, Ms Badenoch and the Conservative Party.