Wigan
Greater Manchester metropolitan borough; PollCheck projects Labour to lose control to Reform UK on 7 May 2026.
Last refreshed: 15 April 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic
Is Wigan's projected Reform gain the Greater Manchester front of the same northern realignment being tracked in Wakefield and Sunderland?
Timeline for Wigan
Mentioned in: PollCheck puts Reform in Labour's north
UK Local Elections 2026- Is Reform UK going to win Wigan Council in May 2026?
- PollCheck projected in April 2026 that Labour would lose control of Wigan metropolitan borough to Reform UK at the 7 May local elections.Source: PollCheck
- What is the local election situation in Greater Manchester in 2026?
- PollCheck projects Reform UK to take control of Wigan, the only Greater Manchester borough included in its expanded April 2026 northern gains forecast. Other Greater Manchester boroughs are not currently flagged as projected gains.Source: PollCheck
- Is Wigan a Labour stronghold?
- Wigan has been Labour-controlled since the creation of the Greater Manchester metropolitan county in 1974. If Reform UK wins control on 7 May 2026 it would be the first change of political control in the borough's history.
Background
Wigan is a metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, a Labour-controlled council since the abolition of the county borough structure. PollCheck projected in April 2026 that Labour would lose control of Wigan to Reform UK at the 7 May local elections, as part of an expanded forecast covering northern industrial councils alongside Sunderland, Wakefield and Barnsley.
Wigan district includes Wigan town, Leigh, Atherton and the surrounding towns of the old Lancashire coalfield. The area voted Leave in 2016 and has experienced the long-term economic pressures associated with deindustrialisation, providing the demographic conditions that polling models associate with Reform support. Like the other projected Labour losses in the north, Wigan represents a type of council that Labour has held since Local Government Reorganisation in 1974.
If the PollCheck projections prove correct across Wigan, Wakefield, Sunderland and Barnsley simultaneously, the 7 May results will rewrite the electoral map of northern England in a way not seen since the 2019 general election's so-called Red Wall collapse, this time at the council rather than Westminster level.