With the Essex County Council elections coming up on May 4, here’s everything you need to know.

Polling stations open at 7am on the day, and close at 10pm. The votes are then taken to the count centre at Debden Park School in Willingale Road, Loughton.

Seven out of the 75 seats on the county council are within the Epping Forest District. Each electoral division elects one county councillor.

Epping Forest county councillors are currently 86 percent Conservative, seven percent Loughton Residents Association and seven percent Liberal Democrat.

Each electoral division within Epping Forest is being contested. The divisions are Buckhurst Hill and Loughton South, Chigwell and Loughton Broadway, Epping and Theydon Bois, Loughton Central, North Weald and Nazeing, Ongar and Rural and Waltham Abbey.

Across the whole of Essex County Council, the Conservatives are the first party, with 44 seats, making up 86 percent of the elected council.

The second party is the Liberal Democrats with nine seats, followed by Labour with eight seats.

Loughton Residents Association currently have one seat.

You can follow the live count, or wait until the results are published on the Guardian Series website.