Fife Council | |
---|---|
Full council election every 5 years. | |
Type | |
Type | |
Leadership | |
Ken Gourlay since July 2023 [1] | |
Structure | |
Seats | 75 |
Political groups | Administration (19):
Other parties (56):
|
Elections | |
Single transferable vote | |
Last election | 5 May 2022 |
Next election | 6 May 2027 |
Meeting place | |
Fife House, North Street, Glenrothes, KY7 5LT | |
Website | |
www |
Fife Council is the local authority for the Fife area of Scotland and is the third largest Scottish council by number of councillors, having 75 elected council members. [2]
Councillors make decisions at its regular council meetings, or at those of its nine other general committees (covering for example tourism and transportation, education, environment, housing, licensing etc.), two planning committees, and seven area committees. [3]
The council has been under no overall control since 2003. Following the 2022 election the Scottish National Party were the largest group on the council, but a minority Labour administration was formed with informal support from the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives.
A Provost of Fife is elected from among the councillors every five years, who chairs the full council meetings and acts as ceremonial head of the council. [4] The current Provost is former football manager Jim Leishman MBE, who was first elected to the post in May 2012 and subsequently re-elected in 2017 and 2022. [5] Political leadership is provided by the leader of the council, with the current leader being Labour councillor David Ross, who has been leader since 2014, being co-leader with David Alexander of the SNP between 2017 and 2022 when he became sole leader again.
Fife was one of Scotland's historic counties, with a Fife County Council existing from 1890 to 1975. In 1975 Fife became a region with three lower-tier district councils: Dunfermline, Kirkcaldy, and North-East Fife. [6] Fife Regional Council and the three district councils were merged in 1996 to form a single council area, governed by Fife Council. [7]
The first election to Fife Regional Council was held in 1974, initially operating as a shadow authority alongside the outgoing authorities until the new system came into force on 16 May 1975. A shadow authority was again elected in 1995 ahead of the change to council areas which came into force on 1 April 1996. Political control since 1975 has been as follows: [8]
Fife Regional Council
Party in control | Years | |
---|---|---|
Labour | 1975–1996 |
Fife Council
Party in control | Years | |
---|---|---|
Labour | 1996–2003 | |
No overall control | 2003–present |
The leaders of the council since 1996 have been: [9] [10]
Councillor | Party | From | To | Notes | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Alex Rowley | Labour | 1 April 1996 | 1998 | ||
Christine May | Labour | 1998 | 2003 | ||
Anne McGovern | Labour | 2003 | 2007 | ||
Peter Grant | SNP | May 2007 | May 2012 | ||
Alex Rowley | Labour | May 2012 | 20 Feb 2014 | ||
David Ross [11] | Labour | 20 Feb 2014 | May 2017 | ||
David Alexander | SNP | May 2017 | May 2022 | Co-leaders [12] | |
David Ross | Labour | ||||
David Ross | Labour | 19 May 2022 |
Fife Council is based at Fife House on North Street, Glenrothes. The building was built in 1969 for the Glenrothes Development Corporation, and became headquarters of Fife Regional Council on its creation in 1975. Prior to 1975 the old Fife County Council had been based at County Buildings, Cupar. Fife House passed to the new Fife Council on local government reorganisation in 1996. [13]
Since 2007 elections have been held every five years under the single transferable vote system, introduced by the Local Governance (Scotland) Act 2004. Election results since 1995 have been as follows: [8]
Year | Seats | SNP | Labour | Liberal Democrats | Conservative | Independent / Other | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1995 | 92 | 9 | 54 | 25 | 0 | 4 | |
1999 | 78 | 9 | 43 | 21 | 1 | 4 | New ward boundaries. [14] |
2003 | 78 | 11 | 36 | 23 | 2 | 6 | |
2007 | 78 | 23 | 24 | 21 | 5 | 5 | New ward boundaries. [15] |
2012 | 78 | 26 | 35 | 10 | 3 | 4 | |
2017 | 75 | 29 | 24 | 7 | 15 | 0 | New ward boundaries. [16] [17] |
2022 | 75 | 34 | 20 | 13 | 8 | 0 | |
Fife is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross and Clackmannanshire. By custom it is widely held to have been one of the major Pictish kingdoms, known as Fib, and is still commonly known as the Kingdom of Fife within Scotland. A person from Fife is known as a Fifer. In older documents the county was very occasionally known by the anglicisation Fifeshire.
Aberdeen City Council is the local government authority for the city of Aberdeen, Scotland. It was created in 1996, under the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994, though a sense of Aberdeen as a city, with its own city council, can be traced back to 1900, when the county of the city of Aberdeen was created.
West Dunbartonshire is one of the 32 local government council areas of Scotland. The area lies to the north-west of the Glasgow City council area and contains many of Glasgow's commuter towns and villages. West Dunbartonshire also borders Argyll and Bute, East Dunbartonshire, Renfrewshire and Stirling.
Glasgow City Council is the local government authority for Glasgow City council area, Scotland. In its modern form it was created in 1996. Glasgow was formerly governed by a corporation, also known as the town council, from the granting of its first burgh charter in the 1170s until 1975. From 1975 until 1996 the city was governed by City of Glasgow District Council, a lower-tier authority within the Strathclyde region.
Falkirk is one of 32 unitary authority council areas of Scotland. It was formed on 1 April 1996 by way of the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994 from the exact boundaries of Falkirk District, one of three parts of the Central region created in 1975, which was abolished at that time. Prior to the 1975 reorganisation, the majority of the council area was part of the historic county of Stirlingshire, and a small part, namely Bo'ness and Blackness, was part of the former county of West Lothian.
Local government in Scotland comprises thirty-two local authorities, commonly referred to as councils. Each council provides public services, including education, social care, waste management, libraries and planning. Councils receive the majority of their funding from the Scottish Government, but operate independently and are accountable to their local electorates. Councils raise additional income via the Council Tax, a locally variable domestic property tax, and Business rates, a non-domestic property tax.
North East Fife was one of three local government districts in the Fife region of Scotland from 1975 to 1996.
North East Fife is a county constituency in Fife, Scotland, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament by Wendy Chamberlain of the Liberal Democrats since the 2019 general election.
Glenrothes is a constituency in Scotland represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2005.
Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath is a county constituency representing the areas around the towns of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, in Fife, Scotland, in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is currently represented by Alba Party politician Neale Hanvey.
South Lanarkshire Council is the unitary authority serving the South Lanarkshire council area in Scotland. The council has its headquarters in Hamilton, has 16,000 employees, and an annual budget of almost £1bn. The large and varied geographical territory takes in rural and upland areas, market towns such as Lanark, Strathaven and Carluke, the urban burghs of Rutherglen, Cambuslang, and East Kilbride which was Scotland's first new town. The area was formed in 1996 from the areas of Clydesdale, Hamilton and East Kilbride districts, and some outer areas of Glasgow district ; all were previously within the Strathclyde region from 1975 but in historic Lanarkshire prior to that.
Midlothian Council is the local authority for Midlothian, one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, covering an area immediately south of the city of Edinburgh. The council is based in Dalkeith. Since the last boundary changes in 2017, eighteen councillors have been elected from six wards.
Dunfermline was a local government district in the Fife region of Scotland from 1975 to 1996, lying to the south-west of the regional capital Glenrothes.
Kirkcaldy was a local government district in the Fife region of Scotland from 1975 to 1996. The district was named after the town of Kirkcaldy but also covered a wider area, including the Fife regional capital of Glenrothes.
Renfrewshire Council is the elected local authority for Renfrewshire council area. Its consists of 43 directly elected councillors who elect from among their number a provost to serve as the council's convener and ceremonial head and a leader of the council who is typically the head of the largest political group.
Elections to Fife Council were held on 3 May 2012, the same day as the other Scottish local government elections. The election used the 23 wards created as a result of the Local Governance (Scotland) Act 2004, with each ward electing three or four Councillors using the single transferable vote system form of proportional representation, with 78 Councillors elected.
The 2017 Scottish local elections were held on Thursday 4 May, in all 32 local authorities. The SNP retained its position as the largest party in terms of votes and councillors, despite suffering minor losses. The Conservatives made gains and displaced Labour as the second largest party, while the Liberal Democrats suffered a net loss of councillors despite increasing their share of the vote. Minor parties and independents polled well; and independent councillors retained majority control over the three island councils. For the first time since the local government reforms in 1995, all mainland councils fell under no overall control.
Elections to Fife Council were held on 4 May 2017, the same day as the other Scottish local government elections. The election used the 22 wards created as a result of the Local Government Commission for Scotland's 5th review which was published in September 2016, with each ward electing three or four councillors using the single transferable vote system form of proportional representation, with 75 councillors elected; a decrease of three seats from 2012 as one ward, The Lochs, was abolished.
James Neale Hanvey is a Scottish politician serving as the Leader of the Alba Party in the House of Commons since 2021, and the Member of Parliament (MP) for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath since 2019.
Elections to Fife Council took place on 5 May 2022 on the same day as the 31 other Scottish local government elections. As with other Scottish council elections, it was held using single transferable vote (STV) – a form of proportional representation – in which multiple candidates are elected in each ward and voters rank candidates in order of preference.