Local Government Act 1972: Encyclopedia II - Local Government Act 1972 - The new local government areas

Local Government Act 1972 - The new local government areas

The Act specified the composition and names of the English and Welsh counties, and the composition of the metropolitan and Welsh districts. It did not specify any names of districts, nor indeed the borders of the non-metropolitan districts — these were specified by Statutory Instrument after the passing of the Act (specifically by the The English Non-metropolitan Districts (Definition) Order 1972, SI 1972/2038).

In England there were 46 counties and 296 districts, in Wales there were 8 and 37. Six of the English counties were designated as metropolitan counties. The new English counties were based clearly on the traditional ones, albeit with several substantial changes. The 13 traditional counties of Wales, however, were abandoned entirely for administrative purposes, and 8 new ones instituted.

Local Government Act 1972 - England

The metropolitan counties were composed as follows:

• Merseyside - based around Liverpool, south-west Lancashire, along with, from the other side of the River Mersey, the Wirral in north-west Cheshire
• Greater Manchester - the Manchester urban area along with many surrounding towns such as Stockport and Bolton
• South Yorkshire - based upon the Sheffield-Rotherham area in the West Riding of Yorkshire
• Tyne and Wear - the Tyneside conurbation based on Newcastle-upon-Tyne in Northumberland, along with Sunderland in County Durham
• West Midlands - Birmingham, Wolverhampton, the Black Country and Coventry
• West Yorkshire - Leeds-Bradford-Huddersfield area in the West Riding

Three new administrative counties were formed focused on old county boroughs as follows —:

• Avon formed from northern Somerset, southern Gloucestershire, and Bristol and Bath
• Cleveland formed from southern Durham and northern part of the North Riding, focusing on the Teesside conurbation along with Guisborough and Hartlepool
• Humberside formed from eastern Yorkshire, particularly Hull and northern Lincolnshire around Scunthorpe and Grimsby

Two were formed from mergers —:

• Cumbria was formed from Westmorland, Cumberland and parts of Lancashire (Furness) and Yorkshire (Sedbergh Rural District)
• Hereford and Worcester formed from the merger of Herefordshire and the parts of Worcestershire not in West Midlands

Other changes to administrative boundaries were —:

• Bournemouth and Christchurch were ceded to Dorset from Hampshire
• County Durham took the Startforth Rural District from the North Riding
• East Suffolk and West Suffolk were merged into Suffolk
• Gatwick Airport was transferred from Surrey to West Sussex
• Lincolnshire was formed from Kesteven, Holland, and the parts of Lindsey not in Humberside
• Huntingdonshire and Peterborough was annexed by Cambridgeshire
• Mid Sussex given from East Sussex to West Sussex
• Norfolk obtained a strip of land near Great Yarmouth from Suffolk including several villages
• North Yorkshire formed from most of the North Riding, along with parts of the West Riding and the East Riding
• Rutland was merged into Leicestershire as a district
• Slough and Eton were ceded from Buckinghamshire to Berkshire
• Tintwistle Rural District ceded from Cheshire to Derbyshire, rather than become separated from Cheshire or become part of Greater Manchester
• Vale of White Horse, including Berkshire's former county town Abingdon was ceded to Oxfordshire
• small parts of the West Riding of Yorkshire ceded to Lancashire, including Barnoldswick and Earby
• Warrington and Widnes, Lancashire towns beyond the southern border of Greater Manchester and Merseyside annexed to Cheshire
• Warwickshire was left being a very odd shape due to the inclusion of Coventry in West Midlands

The only counties to survive entirely unchanged were Cornwall, Hertfordshire, Isle of Wight, Shropshire and Wiltshire. Apart from these, Devon, Essex, Kent, Northamptonshire were only changed by the inclusion of county boroughs.

Many proposals made by the government were actually later withdrawn in favour of more traditional boundaries. The metropolitan counties were significantly trimmed from their original conception before they ended up in the Draft Bill, and were trimmed further before they ended up in the Statute Book. For example, Merseyside lost Skelmersdale, Ellesmere Port and Runcorn, while Greater Manchester lost Glossop and Wilmslow, West Midlands lost Kidderminster and Telford (but gained Coventry) and Tyne and Wear lost Easington. The Act as passed actually included Charlwood and Horley (along with Gatwick Airport) from Surrey into West Sussex, but the 'Charlwood and Horley Act 1974' reversed this.

Cleveland and Avon also experienced trimming at the edges, with Cleveland losing Whitby and Avon losing Frome. Other rejected reforms included the inclusion of Lowestoft with Norfolk, Colchester with Suffolk, and Long Eaton with Nottinghamshire.

The government stood firm on the existence or abolition of county councils. The Isle of Wight (originally scheduled to be merged back into Hampshire as a district) was the only local campaign to succeed, despite protests from Rutland and Herefordshire.

Local Government Act 1972 - Wales

In Wales the new administrative counties generally bore no relation to the traditional counties. Apart from the Glamorgans, all the names were Welsh language names, with no English equivalent. The names were taken from ancient British kingdoms.

In the south, Gwent was a successor authority to Monmouthshire, covering virtually the same territory, and also including Newport county borough. Glamorgan was split into South Glamorgan (with Cardiff), West Glamorgan (with Swansea) and Mid Glamorgan (with Merthyr Tydfil). In West and Mid Wales, two huge counties were established. Dyfed was a merger of Cardiganshire Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire. Powys was formed from the merger of Brecknockshire, Radnorshire and Montgomeryshire, with those entities retained as districts. In the north, Gwynedd and Clwyd were established, the former covering Anglesey, Caernarvonshire and most of Merionethshire, the latter covering Flintshire and most of Denbighshire.

Local Government Act 1972 - Map

1. Northumberland
2. Tyne and Wear †
3. County Durham
4. Cleveland
5. North Yorkshire
6. Cumbria
7. Lancashire
8. Merseyside †
9. Greater Manchester †
10. West Yorkshire †
11. South Yorkshire †
12. Humberside
13. Lincolnshire
14. Nottinghamshire
15. Derbyshire
16. Cheshire
17. Shropshire
18. Staffordshire
19. West Midlands †
20. Warwickshire
21. Leicestershire
22. Northamptonshire
23. Cambridgeshire

24. Norfolk
25. Suffolk
26. Essex
27. Hertfordshire
28. Bedfordshire
29. Buckinghamshire
30. Oxfordshire
31. Gloucestershire
32. Hereford and Worcester
33. Avon
34. Wiltshire
35. Berkshire
36. Greater London *
37. Kent
38. East Sussex
39. West Sussex
40. Surrey
41. Hampshire
42. Isle of Wight
43. Dorset
44. Somerset
45. Devon
46. Cornwall

47. Gwent
48. South Glamorgan
49. Mid Glamorgan
50. West Glamorgan

51. Dyfed
52. Powys
53. Gwynedd
54. Clwyd

† metropolitan county
* 'administrative area' created in earlier legislation

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "The new local government areas", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki