LOCAL GOVERNMENT, 1974-2000
Local Government Reorganization.The extensive discussions on the future of local government in Cheshire
which followed the appointment of the Redcliffe-Maud
Commission in 1966 made it clear that the county
borough alone was too small to survive as a separate
administrative unit. In the end Cheshire continued as a
county council and Chester district council was created
as a second-tier authority which united the county
borough with Chester and Tarvin rural districts. (fn. 10)
There was widespread relief that the city was not
merged into Merseyside, as the commission had proposed, and a recognition that the county borough and
the county had common interests. The county council
was already a powerful presence in the city, and there
were personal links between some county and city
councillors, brought together by common membership
of political parties, churches, and masonic lodges. The
city had been losing its powers since 1945 to county or
regional bodies, was not large enough to afford desirable but expensive public services on its own, and was
already jointly providing secondary education with the
county. Their collaboration was extended before 1974
to library and leisure facilities in Chester. Despite fears
of being swallowed up in a much larger local authority
and wild talk of selling the corporation buses to
Crosville rather than lose them to the county (quelled
when it became clear that the new district council
could continue the bus service), there were also
hopes expressed by the editor of the Conservative
local newspaper, the Cheshire Observer, that 'reform
should give us better government than we have had in
the past'. (fn. 11)
The new district council which came into being in
1974 thus united the city with the extensive suburban
housing estates at Upton and Great Boughton which
had previously lain outside its boundary, but also with
large swathes of countryside. In deference to Chester's
historic past, the district was granted a royal charter
which conferred on it the title of city and allowed the
chairman of the new council to be called mayor. In
1992, on a visit to Chester, the Queen elevated the title
to lord mayor. The ancient offices of alderman and
sheriff were discontinued, along with the last vestiges of
the borough's portmoot, Pentice, and passage courts,
though the city was allowed to describe the ceremonies
by which it admitted freemen as being 'in the Pentice
court'. The county borough's town clerk and treasurer
became chief executive and treasurer of the new
district, which initially had seven main committees to
discharge its responsibilities for planning and development regulations (subject to the formulation of policy
at county level), environmental health, open spaces,
and housing. Conservation was a joint responsibility of
county and district. (fn. 1)
After 1974 at least three quarters of the rates went to
the county to pay for the functions such as education
and social services which it now provided. Despite
government cushioning of the impact of reorganization, the district's rates rose in the first year by an
average of 39 per cent, (fn. 2) in part a measure of the earlier
effectiveness of ratepayer pressure in keeping the
county borough's rates low. After 1979 government
policy was that the private sector should deliver many
local services. Spending restrictions severely curtailed
what local authorities were able to do, and in many
areas stimulated a preference among the public for
better funded unitary authorities. In Cheshire, however, when further reorganization of local government
was projected between 1992 and 1994, Chester city
council's bid for unitary status was undermined by
clear evidence that the reforms of 1974 had taken root
and had strong local support. The Local Government
Commission's recommendation was therefore for no
change. (fn. 3)
Politics. The parliamentary seat was held by the
Conservatives with comfortable majorities in general
elections between 1974 and 1987, but tactical voting by
anti-Tory electors reduced the margin to 1,100 in 1992
and put a Labour M.P. in for the first time in the
landslide of 1997. (fn. 4)
Chester district was divided for local electoral purposes into 27 wards, 15 of which covered the built-up
area of the city. Of the 60 councillors, 41 represented
those urban wards. Each year a third of the seats were
contested, with county council elections taking place in
the fourth year. Party politics dominated the district
council's affairs far more than they had the county
borough's before 1974. The first council consisted of
42 Conservatives, 15 Labour, 2 Independents, and 1
unidentified. The rural seats were held by Conservatives or Independents, a pattern which continued in
2000. Within the urban area, Labour strength was
confined mainly to the council estates, particularly
Blacon, whose wards returned 13 of the party's first
group of councillors. The main feature of later elections was the growth in Liberal Democrat support
from the later 1980s, mostly at the expense of the
Conservatives in the suburban wards dominated
by privately owned housing. After the 1992 elections
the Conservatives had 22 seats, Labour 19, and the
Liberal Democrats 16, with 3 others, necessitating cooperation between the parties. From 1998 the urban
part of the district had an extra ward but only 38
councillors. In 1999 there were 22 Labour councillors,
18 Liberal Democrats, 18 Conservatives, and 2 others. (fn. 5)