With the ballot box at the forefront of Central Bedfordshire Council’s candidates’ minds, it’s high time to begin deciding who you want to represent your ward.

Central Beds is the only unitary authority in Comet country and all of the authority’s councillors will come up for election on May 5.

As it stands the council has a Conservative majority of 53, out of 66 councillors, with the opposition made up of 11 Liberal Democrats and two independent representatives.

However this year sees the number of councillors drop from 66 to 59 after the ward boundaries were redrawn.

Arlesey (3 seats): Ian Dalgarno (Con), David Devereux (Lab), Rita Drinkwater (Con), Douglas Landman (Lab), Lorraine Warwick (Lab), Richard Wenham (Con)

Shefford (2 seats): Lewis Birt (Con), Tony Brown (Con), John Goode (Lib Dem), Paul Mackin (Lib Dem), Nigel Rushby (Lab), Jonathan Shilton (UKIP)

Silsoe and Shillington (1 seat): Carolyn Devereux (Lab), Alison Graham (Lib Dem), Iain Mackilligan (Con), Christopher Puleston (Green)

Stotfold & Langford (3 seats): Paul Bouch (Lab), Jon Clarke (Con), Brian Collier (Lib Dem), Isabella Collier (Lib Dem), Satinderjit Dhaliwal (Lab), George Legate (Lab), Brian Saunders (Con), John Street, Timothy Troon (Lib Dem), Christina Turner, John Saunders (Con)