Cheshire and Warrington will follow Liverpool city region and Greater Manchester down the devolution road and is on track to have an elected mayor by May 2026. Tony McDonough reports

Cheshire and Warrington is set to have an elected mayor in 2026 as the Government agrees to its devolution plan.

It has been confirmed that Cheshire and Warrington have been accepted into the Government’s devolution priority programme. This means it can go ahead and hold a mayoral election in May 2026.

LBN revealed in January that Cheshire West & Chester, Warrington, and Cheshire East were pushing the Government for a devolution deal similar to those in Liverpool city region and Greater Manchester.

They sent a letter to Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, Jim McMahon, following the publication of a White Paper in December 2024, which sets out the Government’s commitment to devolution across England.

This latest news has been welcomed by leaders of the three councils – Louise Gittins, Cheshire West & Chester Council, Hans Mundry, Warrington Council, and the leader and deputy leader of Cheshire East Council, Nick Mannion and Michael Gorman.

In a joint statement, they said: “This announcement is good news for our residents, communities and businesses.

“Cheshire and Warrington being part of the priority programme shows that the Government is confident in Cheshire and Warrington’s ability to seize the opportunities that a devolution agreement could bring.

“It puts us at the front of the queue for significant power and funding and we want to seize this opportunity.

“Devolution would allow us to make more decisions here in Cheshire and Warrington, rather than decisions about our region and its almost 1m residents being made in London.”

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Angela Rayner, Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government confirmed the decision in Parliament.

She said: “I can confirm to members across the House that the places on the devolution priority programme are Cumbria, Cheshire and Warrington, Greater Essex, Hampshire and Solent, Norfolk and Suffolk, and Sussex and Brighton.

She added that Lancashire was “already deciding its mayoral devolution options” and the Government would “look at their proposals in the autumn, in parallel with the priority programme”.