The First Six Months of Reform UK in Durham

Real savings. Real decisions. Real leadership.

⸻

Major financial savings and cost-avoidance already secured

• £21.3m reduction in borrowing, including £12.1m in corporate borrowing, delivering a £720k annual saving in capital financing costs.

• £73m saved on the Tees Valley waste contract after forcing a full review of the Lib Dem-led coalition’s original proposal.

• £10.1m in new financial plan savings proposals to stabilise the council’s finances.

• £1.6m–£6.1m per year in future highways income forecast from the 2026 Lane Rental Scheme — the first in the North East.

Total savings and avoided costs: more than £100 million delivered for County Durham taxpayers.

⸻

Delivering Reform priorities from Day One

• Scrapped Lib Dem Climate Emergency and its expensive Net Zero target — replacing it with a Care Emergency that prioritises vulnerable residents and frontline services.

• Ended automatic prioritisation of solar and wind farms in the County Durham Plan — though Labour’s national rules still allow Ministers to impose them regardless of local objections.

• Introduced Article 4 HMO powers, seeking to halt Labour’s conveyor belt of rapid, unplanned HMO conversions used for centrally-directed asylum accommodation. Communities now have a say, not decisions imposed on them.

• Removed ideological Diversity Training, refocusing councillors on legal duties rather than political lectures.

• Reformed the Council Chamber, restoring proper Union Flags and implementing a new, non-partisan flag protocol.

• Inserted explicit Free Speech protections into the councillor Code of Conduct — Durham now leads the country in defending democratic rights.

• Overhauled the complaints process to prevent vexatious, politically-motivated cases being weaponised against councillors.

⸻

Housing, regeneration, and planning — exposing Labour’s stitched-up system

• Labour has engineered a system where County Durham is forced to rubber-stamp major housing applications: if the council refuses them, it faces vast legal costs — only for a Labour Minister to approve them anyway and leave us with the cost burden.

• Solar farms fall under the same stitch-up: rural counties like ours carry the burden while Westminster collects the virtue points.

• Labour demands London- and Leeds-style housing numbers from a county with completely different needs, geography, and infrastructure.

• We are the first administration honest enough to tell residents the truth: Labour has tied Durham’s hands, but Reform UK is pushing back wherever the law allows.

• That’s why our focus remains on regeneration, not endless sprawl — bringing life back to long-neglected towns and communities Labour abandoned.

• Strategic Place Plans have begun, finally giving residents genuine influence in shaping their areas, instead of being dictated to by Whitehall mandarins.

⸻

Transport & infrastructure actually happening

• £23m CRSTS programme agreed for county-wide highways and transport improvements.

• 18,429 highway defects repaired since May.

• Quarry House Lane footbridge removed, ending decades of dithering and avoiding £1.5m in future maintenance.

• New Hardwick Park investment delivered, including a new play tower and further improvements.

⸻

Cutting bureaucracy & fixing long-ignored problems

• New Council Plan written and approved, with nearly 4,000 public responses and overwhelming backing — a new record.

• Organisational restructure scrapping the old climate-bureaucracy model and restoring Environment-focused services.

• Capital review launched to stop frivolous legacy spending.

• Joint Stocks landfill remediation now progressing properly for the first time in years.

• Independent Peer Review commissioned to improve productivity and performance across the council, something previous Labour and Lib Dem administrations did not do.

⸻

The next wave of Reform

1. Demand Management & Productivity Programme to eliminate embedded waste.

2. Further debt and asset optimisation to reduce financial pressure.

3. Deep scrutiny of waste contracts following the ERF renegotiation success.

4. Completion of the new County Durham Plan, free from solar-farm prioritisation and Net Zero dogma.

5. Housing Allocation Policy overhaul, restoring fairness and local priority.

6. Lane Rental Scheme rollout in 2026, bringing millions annually for potholes, congestion, and road improvements.

⸻

And let’s spell it out: Labour STILL demands a 5% Council Tax rise to plug the deficit they created.

A deficit built by dodging the Care Crisis, dodging reform, and refusing to fight for fair funding for the North East.

Reform UK is cleaning up their mess — and delivering for the people of County Durham. Thank you.