An extraordinary council meeting on 16 September will debate putting Bedford's elected mayor to a referendum. Residents can force one with 6,940 signatures.

Bedford Borough Council has been summoned to an extraordinary meeting on Wednesday 16 September to debate whether the borough should keep its directly elected mayor.

The motion asks the council to agree in principle that residents should vote on it, and to instruct officers to arrange a borough-wide referendum “at the earliest practicable opportunity”. It was submitted by Councillor Abu Sultan, who represents Cauldwell ward and leads the council’s Labour group.

The meeting starts at 6.30pm in the Council Chamber at Borough Hall, Cauldwell Street. The summons was issued on 8 September by the chief executive, Laura Church. It is webcast.

Bedford is one of a small number of English councils run by a mayor the public elects directly. The alternative on offer in the motion is the leader and cabinet model, where councillors choose one of their own number to lead the executive.

What the motion actually asks for

The motion is titled “Giving Residents the Opportunity to Review Bedford Borough Council’s Governance Arrangements”. It sets out five things for the council to resolve:

  • agree in principle that residents should decide whether to keep the directly elected executive mayor or move to a leader and cabinet
  • instruct the chief executive and monitoring officer to arrange a borough-wide referendum at the earliest practicable opportunity
  • instruct the chief executive, monitoring officer and returning officer to handle the administration, including drafting the referendum question and publishing the statutory notices
  • instruct officers to keep every piece of council information about the referendum “factual, balanced, accessible and politically impartial”
  • confirm that the council will implement the result as soon as practicable

The motion is explicit that it is “not a reflection upon any individual mayor, any previous mayor or any political administration”, and that the question is “not who should lead Bedford Borough Council, but whether the council’s governance arrangements remain the most appropriate now and for the future”.

Its argument for a public vote is that the current model came from a public vote. Bedford held its mayoral referendum on 21 February 2002 and elected its first mayor on 17 October that year. The most recent mayoral election was in May 2023.

The published agenda pack runs to four pages and contains the motion and nothing else. There is no officer report attached, so no published estimate of what a referendum would cost, how long it would take to organise, or what the legal route now is.

The arithmetic

Bedford Borough Council has 46 councillors across 28 wards, elected in May 2023, plus the directly elected mayor, who is not one of the 46. The council’s own councillor list gives the current line-up as:

Group Councillors
Conservative 14
Liberal Democrat 13
Labour 12
Green 4
Independent 3

Mayor Tom Wootton is a Conservative. So the administration’s own group holds 14 of the 46 seats on the floor of the chamber. No group has a majority on its own.

The two governance models on the table at Bedford Borough Council A comparison of the mayor and cabinet model Bedford has used since 2002 with the leader and cabinet model the motion of 16 September 2026 would put to a referendum, plus a timeline of key dates from the referendum of 21 February 2002 to the extraordinary council meeting of 16 September 2026. Two ways to run Bedford Borough Council The choice in Councillor Sultan's motion to the extraordinary meeting of 16 September 2026 IN USE SINCE 2002 Mayor and cabinet Voters elect the mayor directly, borough-wide, for a four-year term. The mayor appoints the portfolio holders and proposes the budget. Adopted by referendum, 21 February 2002. THE ALTERNATIVE IN THE MOTION Leader and cabinet The 46 councillors choose a leader from among themselves. No separate borough-wide vote for the office. One way only: section 9KAA bars a council from leaving it again. 21 Feb 2002 Referendum 17 Oct 2002 First mayor elected May 2023 Latest mayoral election 29 Jun 2026 Law rewritten 16 Sep 2026 Motion debated 6,940 signatures is the 5% threshold for residents to force a mayoral referendum themselves, for petitions presented between 1 April 2026 and 31 March 2027. Sources: Bedford Borough Council agenda and election records; Local Government Act 2000 as amended 29 June 2026. Graphic by The Bedford Times
Bedford has elected its mayor directly since a referendum on 21 February 2002. Section 9KAA of the Local Government Act 2000, inserted on 29 June 2026, means a move to leader and cabinet could not be reversed.

The law changed in June, and it points both ways

Here is the part the motion does not address. It instructs officers to act “in accordance with the Local Government Act 2000”, and that Act was substantially rewritten on 29 June 2026 by the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026.

Three changes matter here, all of them on the statute book now:

That last limb is the one that makes the motion work on its own terms: whatever the position on the 2002 vote, a council can choose to put the question to residents.

There is a fourth change, and it is the one nobody in Bedford has been told about. A new section 9KAA, also inserted on 29 June 2026, says a council operating a leader and cabinet executive in England “must not cease to operate” executive arrangements or that form of executive, and that the duty applies “whenever it began to operate” it.

In plain terms, the door only swings one way. If Bedford dropped the elected mayor, the statute as it now stands would not let it go back.

What it means for you

Residents do not have to wait for the council. Under the Local Authority (Referendums) (Petitions and Directions) (England) Regulations 2000, a petition signed by 5% of local government electors forces a referendum on whether the council should have an elected mayor. Bedford publishes the number every year.

For Bedford the threshold is 6,940 signatures. That figure comes from the council’s own publication of verification number, signed by Laura Church as electoral registration officer and dated 16 February 2026. It is 5% of the electorate on the revised register in force on 15 February 2026, and it applies to petitions presented between 1 April 2026 and 31 March 2027.

Two caveats on that. The notice was published in February, four months before the Act changed the surrounding law, and the council has not republished it since. And the council says a lower number may replace it if the 2026 canvass produces one.

Watching the meeting. The agenda for 16 September lists only apologies, declarations of interest and the motion itself. Unlike the Executive, an extraordinary full council meeting carries no public questions item, so the way to follow it is the webcast or the public gallery at Borough Hall.

Why it matters beyond the constitution. The mayor proposes the budget and the council tax, and appoints the portfolio holders who take executive decisions on planning, bins and roads. Our pages on Bedford council tax bands and Bedford planning news cover the decisions that flow from that office.

Sources