England mayoral elections move to supplementary vote
On 17 June 2026, ministers signed the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026 (Commencement No. 1 and Saving) Regulations 2026. The title is a mouthful, but legislation.gov.uk makes the practical effect clear: from 18 June, some mayoral elections in England must be run using the supplementary vote system. That sounds dry, but it changes a basic question on the ballot paper: do you mark only a first choice, or can you also give a second preference? For voters, candidates and election teams, that is not a small detail. It shapes how campaigns speak to the public and how winning votes are counted.
If the phrase supplementary vote feels unfamiliar, here is the plain-English version. You are usually asked for a first preference and a second preference. If one candidate wins more than half of first-preference votes straight away, they are elected. If nobody clears that mark, only the top two stay in the contest, and second preferences from eliminated candidates are then checked to see whether they help either of the final two. **What this means:** the system is meant to reward not just strong first-choice support, but wider acceptability as well. A candidate may still need loyal backing, but being an acceptable second choice for lots of voters can matter too.
The regulation does not rewrite every local election in England. It is aimed at elections for combined authority mayors and combined county authority mayors, which are the mayors who lead some wider regional bodies rather than a single council area. Although section 63 carries a title mentioning mayors and police and crime commissioners, the provisions actually commenced here are the ones the explanatory note says require these two kinds of mayoral election to be conducted using supplementary vote. This is also a useful reminder that legislation often works in stages. A law can be passed first and brought into force later through commencement regulations. If you have ever wondered why a new Act exists on paper before you notice any practical change, that is often the reason.
The word saving in the title is easy to miss, but it matters. In legal writing, a saving provision keeps the old rule in place for a limited set of cases. Here, regulation 3 says the new supplementary vote changes do not apply if the notice of election was published before 18 June 2026. That notice is the formal step that starts an election timetable. **Why timing matters:** if an election has already been officially launched, the system used for that contest stays as it was. That helps avoid a mid-campaign switch in ballot design, voter instructions and counting rules. So when you are checking what system your area will use, the key question is not only when polling day falls, but when the notice of election was issued.
For upcoming mayoral elections, that cut-off date could be the difference between a ballot that asks for first and second preferences and a ballot that still uses the rules already in place when the contest was called. That is why a technical line in a statutory instrument matters far beyond Westminster or Whitehall. It affects campaign leaflets, public information, candidate strategy and the way local media explain the race. It also matters for media literacy. Electoral rules can change quietly, in legal language that most people will never sit down and read. Our job, and yours as a careful reader, is to translate that into the real-life question voters actually face: what will my ballot paper look like when I arrive at the polling station?
The explanatory note says this is the first set of commencement regulations made under the 2026 Act. It also says an impact assessment, with an addendum on the supplementary vote provision, expects no significant effect on business, charities or the public and voluntary sector. That may sound reassuringly administrative, but for democratic participation the change is still important because clarity on voting rules helps people take part with confidence. So the simplest reading of this instrument is also the most useful one. From 18 June 2026, some English mayoral elections are to use the supplementary vote system, but not if the election was already formally under way because its notice of election was published before that date. When legal wording gets this dense, it helps to bring it back to three plain questions: who is voting, how do they mark the ballot, and when does the new rule start?