Have the Wheels Just Come Off Reform’s Campaign in Durham...?

Reforms plans for Durham County Council look like they're coming apart, as the local council faces £20m pounds of savings having to be found...

28th August 2025

In the wake of Reform UK's triumphant takeover of Durham County Council in May 2025, the party promised a radical overhaul of council spending, vowing to root out waste and inefficiency without resorting to the tired tactics of tax hikes or service cuts.

Drawing inspiration from Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in the US, Reform pledged to deploy AI-driven audits, data analytics, and forensic accounting to slash "fraud, corruption, and waste" from the council's books. This bold vision was meant to mark a departure from decades of Labour dominance in the region and the subsequent coalition rule, ushering in an era of fiscal prudence that would protect vulnerable residents in one of England's most deprived regions & prove to locals that a council under Labour was a council of wasteful spending & decades of deprivation.

Yet, just months later, it seems the wheels have spectacularly come off Reforms campaign wagon, as the Reform-led DCC now stares down a £20 million budget deficit and prepares to rubber-stamp sweeping cuts to essential services—ironically, the very measures they once decried.

The irony is stark. Reform's ascent to power, securing a commanding 65 seats out of 98 in the May 2025 elections, was fuelled by promises of transformative efficiency, growth & regeneration of County Durham's most deprived areas, with party leader Nigel Farage celebrating the victory with warnings to council officials about "working from home," signalling a no-nonsense approach to public sector bloat.

Its claimed councillors for DCC were still waiting the arrival of Reforms DOGE team as of Late July 2025

Central to this was the DOGE-style audit, which Reform announced would scrutinise Durham's County Councils operations, with teams of experts dispatched to identify wasteful spending. However, despite the fanfare, the audit's results have been underwhelming at best. Opposition councillors reported being "completely in the dark" about the plans, and as of late July 2025, council officials were said to be still awaiting the arrival of the DOGE team.

On the surface, it seems the only tangible "savings" stem from merely symbolic gestures, such as the outright defunding of Durham Pride events for 2026—a move announced by Deputy Leader Darren Grimes, who declared the festival would receive "not a single penny" from the council.

This decision, coupled with the removal of Pride and Ukraine flags from council buildings, whilst proving to be popular with locals has drawn accusations of promoting division rather than delivering meaningful fiscal reform from opposition councillors. Meanwhile, the real financial crunch has forced Reform's hand in ways that now directly contradict their election rhetoric. Facing a projected £20 million shortfall for the next fiscal year, Council Leader Andrew Husband has issued pleas for more central government funding, blaming the national Local Government Fair Funding Review for failing to address soaring costs in adult and children's social care.

While grant fundings reportedly set to increase, it's claimed the funding falls far short of covering these pressures, leaving the council with what Husband calls a "stark choice": raise council taxes or slash services.

Cross-party criticism of the government's funding model is nothing new, very similar instances have occurred in nearby Hartlepool Borough Council, however after 15years of the same excuses, locals claim the Governments alleged lack of grant funding is an excuse running its course but under Reform's watch at DCC, the response has been to propose changes that hit the most vulnerable hardest, ironically, the very vulnerable households that voted them in !

Chief among these is the proposed overhaul of the Council Tax Reduction Scheme (CTRS), which could end 100% support for low-income, working-age residents. This means introducing a minimum payment requirement, effectively increasing bills for thousands in deprived areas like Bishop Auckland and Newton Aycliffe—regions that Reform claimed to champion during their campaign. Opposition Labour councillors have warned that this will exacerbate poverty, with reduced disposable income leading to greater stress on families and potentially higher demands on already strained social services.

In a region where no other local council offers full protection to its most needy households, Durham's move would leave it isolated, amplifying the human cost of fiscal austerity. Critics argue that DCC, whilst launching consultations on these changes claim it's a foregone conclusion under Reform's majority rule & would be a huge blow to local households.

This predicament raises uncomfortable questions about Reform's governance credentials. Where is the promised bounty from the DOGE audit? Why has the hunt for "wasteful spending" yielded only politically charged cuts to cultural events like Pride, while essential supports for the deprived are on the chopping block?

Moreover, its claimed Reform's earlier moves to scrap climate pledges—rescinding the council's climate emergency declaration—suggest a pattern of prioritising ideological battles over pragmatic solutions leading to what many claim is a political party with little left in the tank in terms of what it intends to do next other than pile on the cuts & blame the previous Labour held administration.

As the Cabinet prepares to review the budget on September 17, 2025, the pressure is said to be mounting. The government has maintained council tax referendum thresholds to curb excessive rises, but without adequate funding reforms, Durham's options strictly remain limited.

Areas such as Horden, in County Durham, a former Mining Village could be hit the hardest from Reform's proposed cuts

For a party that rode into power on waves of populism and promises of efficiency, Reform's early stumble could now seriously erode public trust. In County Durham's deprived heartlands, particularly those of its former mining communities, residents may soon ask: If Reform can't deliver on its core pledges without hurting the vulnerable, what was the point of the upheaval?