4 min read38 min Complaints made against councillors’ conduct have risen sharply at local authorities that held elections last year, figures obtained by PoliticsHome show. The largest rise revealed in the data is at Staffordshire County Council, where there has been a 1,300 per cent increase in the number of complaints since Reform UK won control at the 2025 local elections a year ago. As voters prepare to go to the polls for another set of local elections next week, experts said the data was a reflection of the UK’s increasingly polarised political climate. The findings show that in many local authorities, the dramatic rise in complaints has been driven by objections to councillors’ behaviour on social media. Lucy Bush, Director of Research and Participation at the think tank, Demos, told PoliticsHome that the numbers are “indicative of today’s deeply polarised political environment, where strong negative emotions are driving engagement, where disagreements are sharper and where tolerance has evaporated”. Councillors are required to abide by their council’s agreed code of conduct, which must be based on the Committee on Standards in Public Life’s seven principles of …