Rochdale. May 7 2026 result and what's next

What happened on May 7

Seats won and overall control

After May 7

Labour majority

Council size: 60 seats · 20 up on May 7

Reform UK

14 of 60 seats

Won 13 on May 7 · had 1 before

Next election

May 2027

By thirds, three years in four.

Post-May 7 composition

Every party's seat count on the new council

Labour

31

Reform UK

14

Conservative

7

Independent / Other

5

Lib Dem

3

Pre-May-7 composition is the latest OCD snapshot of who held each seat; post is pre minus seats up plus actual winners.

How accurate was the model here?

Our 7 May 2026 forecast for Rochdale

35% 7 / 20 winners called correctly across this council's wards

6.00pp major-party MAE, average gap between predicted and actual share

-7.20pp Reform UK signed bias, positive = predicted hot, negative = predicted cold

Locked, sha256-witnessed forecast scored against the actual count. See the full national accuracy audit →

Our locked May 7 forecast

The pre-election prediction

Labour

12

Conservative

3

Workers Party

2

Reform UK

1

Lib Dem

1

Independent

1

This is the seats-on-the-ballot projection we published before polls opened, used here for accuracy comparison only.

All wards

Per-ward forecast vs actual

Ward	Our top pick	Actual winner	Predicted share	Confidence
Balderstone & Kirkholt	Reform UK	Reform UK	36.1%	high
Bamford	Conservative	Conservative	36.0%	high
Castleton	Labour	Reform UK	31.8%	high
Central Rochdale	Workers Party	Workers Party	36.8%	high
East Middleton	Labour	Labour	41.1%	high
Healey	Labour	Reform UK	28.2%	high
Hopwood Hall	Labour	Reform UK	45.1%	high
Kingsway	Labour	Labour	29.9%	high
Littleborough Lakeside	Labour	Reform UK	34.7%	high
Milkstone & Deeplish	Workers Party	Workers Party	46.9%	high
Milnrow & Newhey	Lib Dem	Reform UK	41.4%	high
Norden	Conservative	Conservative	31.6%	high
North Heywood	Labour	Reform UK	41.5%	high
North Middleton	Independent	Reform UK	32.2%	high
Smallbridge & Firgrove	Labour	Lib Dem	34.8%	high
South Middleton	Labour	Reform UK	51.6%	high
Spotland & Falinge	Labour	Reform UK	27.9%	high
Wardle, Shore & West Littleborough	Conservative	Reform UK	40.2%	high
West Heywood	Labour	Reform UK	37.0%	high
West Middleton	Labour	Reform UK	55.6%	high

← All councils