Sam Smith: Reform UK has meant an erosion of democratic representation in Nottinghamshire

Cllr Sam Smith is the Leader of the Conservative Group on Nottinghamshire County Council and a councillor for Newark East.

While Conservative-run, Nottinghamshire County Council had a proud track record of protecting rural bus routes, maintaining a thriving library and youth service, investing record amounts into repairing roads and pavements, and never increasing Council Tax by the maximum. Now Reform-led, it is known across the Atlantic as the media blackout area, which Nigel Farage was challenged about in the US Congress last week after his Reform Leader in Nottinghamshire banned the press from interviewing Reform councillors and receiving press releases.

Oh, what a five months we have had! The sad reality is the erosion of the democratic representation of residents right across our great county of Nottinghamshire.

Since May 2025, when Reform UK took control of Nottinghamshire County Council, a series of decisions have sparked growing concern about the state of local democracy and the democratic representation of residents. What should have been a new chapter of leadership and accountability has instead raised serious questions about transparency, scrutiny, and the values on which open government is built. From restricting press access and closing down debate to cancelling meetings and limiting the ability of opposition councillors to question cabinet members, Reform’s actions collectively suggest an erosion of democratic culture at one of the country’s largest county councils.

Reform won the May election on empty promises that are undeliverable from County Hall – they included: stopping the boats, creating more GP appointments, and restoring the winter fuel allowance. It is no wonder that Nottinghamshire County Council is now in a state of limbo, with no clear direction or local policies.

The most striking change has been the administration’s approach to the local press. Not long after taking office, Reform councillors announced that they would not engage with the Nottingham Post, Nottinghamshire Live, or with BBC-funded Local Democracy Reporters. This meant no press releases, no interviews with the Reform leadership, Cabinet and Councillors, and no invitations to council events, except in what they described as cases of “emergency”. In practical terms, it is a media blackout that cuts off long-established channels between elected officials and the local press corps. By cutting off the press, Reform UK risks leaving the people of Nottinghamshire in the dark about decisions that affect their everyday lives. It also means that the Reform administration will be disconnected from the priorities of local residents. In an era when disinformation is already a problem, creating a vacuum in trusted reporting makes the democratic deficit even sharper.

When quizzed about this in Congress while speaking about free speech, Nigel Farage said he was ‘going to have a word’ with Nottinghamshire County Council’s Reform Leader about this press ban. So who knows what will happen next.

Equally troubling is the way Reform has restructured power within the council itself. Traditionally, as when the Conservatives led the Council, the vice-chairman roles on committees were shared across political groups, ensuring that no single party has unchecked influence. These arrangements guarantee that scrutiny committees have independence from those being scrutinised. Yet Reform UK decided to allocate every chair and vice-chair position to its own councillors. This consolidation of power effectively removes the opposition from meaningful roles in shaping oversight. As Opposition, we argue that Reform is now marking its own homework. Without diversity of representation in these leadership positions, the committees risk becoming rubber-stamping exercises rather than genuine forums of accountability. The result is a narrowing of democratic representation, where the voices of communities not represented by Reform are almost entirely excluded from the decision-making process. In a county with over 800,000 residents, such concentration of power sits uneasily with the principle of representative democracy.

It was also frustrating and stifling when, early on, a wave of important meetings were cancelled. In the first two months of Reform’s administration, nearly half of the scheduled council meetings were cancelled, including those of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, the Governance and Ethics Committee, and a series of cabinet sessions. These are central to the council’s ability to manage policy, spending, and ethical standards. The cancellations were reckless and dangerous, leaving the Council in paralysis without political direction. Local residents were denied opportunities to follow and influence the debates that shape services they depend on.

The attitude towards debate and questioning at the meetings that do take place has also concerned us. At the first public cabinet meeting of the new administration in late June, Reform Cabinet Members declined to answer direct questions from opposition councillors. By refusing to answer questions on the record in front of the public, the administration weakened one of the most visible mechanisms of democratic accountability and is stripping away the representation of residents’ views.

As Leader of the Opposition, I argued that residents expect their elected representatives to be able to question those in power openly and directly, and that anything less is a disservice to the people who elected them. Reform’s defence was that answers could be provided before or after meetings in private offices, but accountability delayed is accountability denied. Democracy is not merely about decision-making; it is about debate, focused on delivering on the priorities of residents, and the public visibility of those processes.

When these strands are taken together, the exclusion of the press, the concentration of committee power, the cancellation of scrutiny meetings, and the stifling of public questioning, they reveal a consistent trajectory. Rather than fostering open government, Reform UK leadership has narrowed the spaces where the voices of residents can be heard via their elected representative and where leaders can be challenged. This is not just a matter of local politics.

Local government is the level of democracy that most directly touches citizens’ lives, from schools to social care to transport. Weakening its democratic representation therefore has consequences for trust in the wider political system. Nottinghamshire’s experiment risks normalising a culture where power is centralised, critical oversight is reduced, and the public is less informed about decisions made in their name.

What makes this trajectory especially paradoxical is that Reform UK has built much of its national brand on the rhetoric of plain speaking, common sense, and standing up for ordinary people. Yet the actions in Nottinghamshire suggest a party less interested in empowering people than in consolidating its own control. Far from opening up local politics, it has curtailed the very freedoms of information, debate, and accountability that sustain democracy. If this approach spreads to other councils, it could transform local government into something narrower, more insular, and more authoritarian. Nottinghamshire, once a place where traditions of scrutiny and press freedom allowed residents to hold leaders to account, risks becoming a cautionary tale of how quickly democratic values can be undermined when those in power treat openness as an inconvenience rather than a duty.