In what is likely to be a dramatic set of local elections this May, Birmingham is poised to be one of the most notable, with huge opportunities for the Liberal Democrats.
Think of Birmingham City Council and it’s likely the words ‘bankruptcy’ or ‘bin strike’ will come to mind. While these have done huge damage to the city, they are just a couple of the worst examples of Birmingham Labour’s failures. For example, the council has suffered badly from the botched implementation of a new IT system, now 4 years late with cost overruns of more than £100m. These failures have had a hugely damaging impact on the city. Birmingham’s relative levels of deprivation and child poverty, already bad, have worsened significantly in recent years.
Birmingham does have huge potential, thanks to ongoing major investments linked to the coming of HS2 and plans for a new multi-billion pound Sports Quarter led by the owners of Birmingham City. The opportunities to unleash the talents of our young city on the world are huge, but this will clearly require a change of leadership in the Council.
Be of no doubt, Brummies are fed up of the Labour Party. The combination of national unpopularity and local failure will be toxic for them at the ballot box in May. Already the signs of change are notable. Labour lost a vote in November’s Full Council and while largely symbolic it highlighted their losses through defections and our recent by election gain in Moseley. These have taken their numbers down from 65 out of 101 Councillors after the 2022 elections, to 53 now.
The question is not whether they will go, but who will replace them. There is clearly a risk that we jump out of the Labour frying pan into the Reform fire or the chaos and division of Your Party. By contrast, we are offering a positive platform of change focusing on getting the Council running efficiently, listening to communities and delivering core services well.
The 2026 local elections will see a 6 or even 7 party system operating in the city, so organisation and targeting will be particularly important, with seats likely to be won with as little as 25% of the vote. As well as ourselves and Labour we have one of the few remaining urban Conservative groups and a couple of Greens. Significant new challenges will clearly come from Reform and in the inner-city areas; the Your Party / Independent movement will challenge, though they may break into different factions.
The Liberal Democrats have seen steady growth in recent years. in the 2022 all up elections we grew from 8 to 12 and in Moseley made the only by election gain by any party in the current term. We represent all types of ward, from inner-city Aston, to middle class Moseley and the more suburban areas of Yardley. The hard work of our councillors and campaigners stands in stark contrast to what many communities have experienced under Labour.
We are now looking to win new seats across large parts of the city. In most Labour held wards the party that can establish themselves as the local challenger to them will have a great chance of winning and we are aiming to do that in as many seats as possible.
There was a real change of mood in the city after the 2025 May elections which saw dramatic gains for the Lib Dems and Reform in neighbouring counties such as Warwickshire. Candidates new to politics and significant number of former councillors are getting stuck into the slog of door knocking and leaflet delivery and the response on the doorstep in highly encouraging.
Big Lib Dem gains in Birmingham will help show the Party as being as relevant in Labour facing areas as in former remain voting Tory areas and help spur the next stage of our growth as the party best placed to stop Reform. Already we are getting significant help from outside the city and are looking forward to welcoming several of our MPs to join the campaign over the next 4 months. It’s great that our efforts in supporting recent council and general election campaigns in Warwickshire and Shropshire are being repaid and we welcome support from all those who can help us win.
* Cllr Roger Harmer is the leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Birmingham City Council.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
The Joy of Six 1528
Endometriosis and acetylation
Reform makes first gain from Conservatives in this by-election cycle
How Chancellor Reeves torpedoed the economy
Michael Meadowcroft: A Liberal of Intellectual Rigour and Uncommon Integrity
Geoff Reid
Tom Bailey
Leonora Scipio
Kira Collins
Daniel Walker
12 Comments
Roger and his team deserve to win. They are both working hard and developing new ideas and relationships to stem the Reform advance and bring sanity and clarity to the City’s governance
When you win control of the council and contracts have to be signed Go for the company that gives the most sensible price (not necessarily the lowest price).Write into the contract that the cost MUST NOT RISE OVER 10% above their quote and be finished on time and inspected BEFORE OTHER CONTRACTS offered.If it does succeed other contracts are then available with same conditions. If it goes over 10% fines are put in place after inspection.The contract must be tight re specific ie ONE thing only involved. Just a brief thought as a contract has to be thought out in detail but the country used to be able to build (and other things) rapidly and successfully and to budget. Costs did not rise out of control.
Very exciting prospect Roger – I look forward to further visits to Birmingham to help.
> Go for the company that gives the most sensible price (not necessarily the lowest price)
The BCC IT rolling disaster has been featured in the IT press for years. With a bit of detail.
A lot of costs have been sunk, and even a continue/restart decision may be far from clear. Commissioning expert advice might be needed. Accepting the result might be painful.
Also the ruling group after the election might be a coalition. There might not be a political consensus. The consequences of the equal opportunities issue still roll on.
Possibly the best outcome for Birmingham might be a Lib Dem administration that can convene the grown-ups and reject the populists and One-Party Rule types.
What, in realistic practical terms, does Councillor Harmer propose to do to end the bin strike ? “Not being Labour” is a slogan and an attitude……. it is not a policy.
Roger makes a sound strategic objective when he says “In most Labour held wards the party that can establish themselves as the local challenger to them will have a great chance of winning and we are aiming to do that in as many seats as possible.” The key question is how Birmingham Lib Dems will decide which seats have they sufficient resources to establish themselves? In 2022 when they gained 4 seats to go from 8 to 12 councillors, we were second in only 6 wards and of those, our vote share was only over 30% in three.
So holding both seats in Mossley where we finished 1st and 4th last time, plus Small Heath where the vote share was roughly 43% Lab, 28% Lib Dem and 19% Con (2 gains) and Ward End 43% Lab, 34% LD, 17% Con (1 gain) would seem to be it. I can’t see anywhere else where we come anywhere close if the Labour vote splits 50-50, with Reform or Independents getting the rest of it, and nowhere at all where we were second to the Cons at all.
Thanks all for the feedback. In terms of ending the bin strike, it will of course hopefully be over by May, but if not, it will almost certainly be ended via a negotiation between people who have confidence in each other and not by making offers and counter offers publicly. In terms of David Evan’s point, it’s probably not that meaningful to look at which seats fall on what swings, when the Labour are likely to lose over half their vote in many seats. I am confident we will win seats where we were over 50% behind them last time. Which and how many is the question..
Great city. The birthplace of the National Liberal Federation 150 years ago, that made our party such a force in the late 19th century and which did so much to advance local civic governance. A city made famous by Telly Savalas and Peaky Blinders. Come be a part of real change once again.
@David Evans; Analysis of the 2022 results in Birmingham is not the whole story. The maths provide an indication of possible target seats in 2026, but the incompetence of the governing Labour Party over the last few years suggest the way is open for major change in May, and an opportunity for the Lib Dems to take advantage as Roger says.
In Shropshire last year, the Lib Dems took over from the Conservatives by winning 42 of the 74 seats and coming close in a few others. Unfortunately, they inherited virtual bankruptcy from the Tories, as a new governing party in BCC will no doubt experience in 2026. Working in co-operation with others rather than confrontation may be needed.
Sounds like we have some great people and opprotunities in Birmingham.
But alas we also have some problems. It was worrying to see that a LD councillor was among those lobbying for Jthe Aston Villa match to be canncelled becuase ” We are the voice of the people. And this is something that a lot of people in Aston do not want.”. The same cllr sat on the safety board despite already saying previouly that the match should not go ahead did not recuse themselves. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/police-drew-up-false-evidence-after-decision-to-ban-maccabi-tel-aviv-fans-9m6pw5qbd
With regards to Simon McGrath’s comments, I don’t subscribe to The Times, so can’t comment on their piece but the whole story of the Aston Villa SAG is complex and has been heavily misreported, often one suspects to promote particular agendas. Throughout the development of the story, the Birmingham Group has worked closely with Party HQ and Max Wilkinson MP as our Home Affairs Spokesperson and has kept comments to those agreed with the Party in order to take the heat out of the matter and to minimise community division. This has worked well and we will continue to do so.
All minority parties will do well in the forthcoming 2026 local election.
Labour are toast due to bin strike, IT failure and overspend, service cuts. My constituency MP (labour) will not intervene to end the bin strike. Shame on him. Roger is truly supportive of Acocks Green residents.