May elections: What does Exeter City Council do?
BBCPower could change hands at Exeter City Council in the local elections to be held on 7 May.
Labour has been in charge of the council since 2012 and the city has had a Labour MP since 1997, but Labour was wiped out in Exeter at the county council elections in May 2025.
The council is responsible for services from waste and recycling to deciding planning applications and providing leisure centres.
Labour currently holds 22 of the 39 seats on Exeter City Council and is defending eight of those seats in the forthcoming elections.
What does the council do?
Exeter City Council has a certain set of responsibilities with other council services provided by Devon County Council.
The city council is responsible for housing in Exeter, including managing homes owned by the council, managing the housing waiting list and setting targets for the numbers of new homes to be built.
Related to housing, the city council also looks after most of the planning applications for property development - that might be anything from a garage extension to a block of flats.
When it decides on larger planning applications, the council can also decide the amount of money a developer will have to contribute to the city and where that money will be spent.
Leisure services such as swimming pools and gyms are provided by the city council, which is also responsible for managing the facilities and employing staff.
The city council is responsible for any waste, food and recycling collections in Exeter, but the county council manages the recycling centres around Devon.
Car parks in Exeter are also run by the city council, which decides how much they will cost, but on-street parking is run by the county council.
Other services such as education, transport, libraries and social care are all run by the county council.
All of this is about to change in Devon under a massive reorganisation of local government, where all of the district councils and the county council will be abolished.
They will be replaced by unitary authorities that look after all of the council services in an attempt to make it easier for the public to understand who does what.
What are the May elections?
The elections being held in May are for a third of the seats on Exeter City Council with the addition of an extra seat in Heavitree after Green Party councillor Carol Bennett announced she was standing down.
There are 39 seats in total, so elections will be held for 14 seats.
Elections for a third of the seats are normally carried out every year, with a fourth year where no elections take place.
A party or a group of parties working together need 20 seats to form a majority.
Labour has a majority with 22, the Green Party is the second largest with seven seats, the Liberal Democrats have four and the Conservatives, Reform and an Independent Group all have two.
Out of the 14 seats where elections will take place, eight of them are held by Labour, three are currently Green Party with the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and Reform UK all defending one seat each.
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