Fact checking the local, mayoral and police commissioner elections

Tomorrow, 2 May 2024, sees elections for councillors and mayors taking place across parts of England, and for Police and Crime Commissioners in England and Wales. 

In recent days we’ve been looking into a number of claims related to these elections, as well as making sure voters have access to accurate, relevant information on how the elections themselves work. 

This includes our investigation which revealed council websites were giving voters in England and Wales out-of-date information on the electoral system used in the elections. Full Fact’s intervention has ensured these websites have been updated, so they now correctly refer to ‘First Past the Post’, the system which will be used tomorrow. 

And yesterday we published an explainer on the rules about voter ID, after seeing a number of misleading claims about the new rules, as well as reports from the Electoral Commission that in last May’s local elections about 14,000 people who went to a polling station were unable to vote, as they didn’t have the right ID.

We’ve also fact checked claims from politicians standing in one of the biggest contests tomorrow, for Mayor of London.

This includes a claim from the Conservatives that the current Labour mayor, Sadiq Khan, is planning to introduce a pay-per-mile scheme for motorists in the capital. (Mr Khan has ruled out introducing a pay-per-mile scheme, though the Conservatives have argued this pledge can’t be trusted and Mr Khan has previously spoken of the potential for introducing such a scheme in the future.)

Last week we also fact checked three claims from BBC London’s live mayoral debate—this included looking at whether it’s true that Transport for London fares have been “frozen”, and whether “ordinary Londoners” can afford to live in the city. And today we’ve investigated claims from Labour that Conservative candidate Susan Hall plans to “cancel” universal free school meals in the capital.