The Register of Local Parties for Local People

The Register of Political Parties is maintained by the Electoral Commission and was introduced by the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. A listing on the register is a requirement if you want your party name to appear on the ballot paper when standing in national and local elections in the UK. For reasons, there are two separate registers, one for Great Britain and one for Northern Ireland, plus a register for "minor parties" (those who only contest parish-level elections).

As of 10th February 2021, there are 339 parties on the GB register - some of which stand thousands of candidates each year and some which have apparently never (yet) appeared on a ballot paper. There are large "broad church" parties like Labour and the Conservatives, campaigning organisations like the National Health Action Party, and small esoteric and extremist parties (not to mention one-person parties such as the semi-religious Church of the Militant Elvis).

But there are also many parties with a geographic basis, ranging from large national and regional parties like the SNP and the Yorkshire Party, down to ultra-local groups like the Handforth Ratepayers Association. At a rough count there are 167 parties whose focus is on a county-sized area or smaller. The following map is based on the registered address of each party:

 

A few points of note:

1. Surrey appears to be a particular hot spot for local parties - no fewer than 25 such parties are registered within a 20km radius of Weybridge. Note that few of these parties compete at general elections (where most of the seats are safely Conservative) but at local level some of them have significant strength - the Residents Associations of Epsom and Ewell have controlled the district council since 1937.

2. Scotland, by contrast, is almost bereft of local parties - only the West Dunbartonshire Community Party and the Orkney Manifesto Group appear to be active. I don't know whether this is a consequence of Scotland's adoption of Single Transferable Vote in local elections, or maybe local parties have never been a thing in Scotland?

3. There are 22 additional parties on the Minor Parties register which is for groups that only intend to stand in parish and town council elections (although the odd one does sneak through in a higher level election). Most of these are focused on a single parish, but since parish council candidates can stand with any description, the need to register as a party is less pressing.

4. Fifteen different parties claim to be "First" - five of them are in East Lancashire. By contrast, out of 38 parties with "Residents" in their name, only three are north of Birmingham (Crewe Residents Group, Residents of Wilmslow and the anti-fracking campaign Formby Residents Action Group).

5. One local councillor in Castle Donington has registered The Local Party, which may come as a surprise to those parties whose applications have been rejected due to being "confusingly similar to another already registered party".