Since the 2025local elections the council has been under the majority control of Reform UK; this is the first time since the creation of the current council in 1974 that the Conservative Party or Labour Party has not been the largest party. The leader of the council, Stephen Atkinson, chairs a cabinet of eight councillors. The Chief Executive and Director of Resources is Mark Wynn.
Elected county councils were created in 1889 under the Local Government Act 1888, taking over many administrative functions that had previously been performed by unelected magistrates at the quarter sessions. Fifteen boroughs were considered large enough for their existing councils to provide county-level services, and so they were made county boroughs, independent from the new county council. They were:[5]
The 1888 Act also placed each urban sanitary district which straddled county boundaries in one county, and so Lancashire gained the parts of Ashton under Lyne, Stalybridge, and Warrington which had been in Cheshire, and the parts of Mossley which had been in Cheshire and Yorkshire. Lancashire ceded its part of Todmorden to the West Riding of Yorkshire. Lancashire County Council was elected by and provided services to the parts of the county (as thus adjusted) outside the county boroughs. The county council's area was termed the administrative county.[6][7]
Three more boroughs were later elevated to become county boroughs: Warrington in 1900, Blackpool in 1904, and Southport in 1905.[6]
The first elections were held in January 1889 and the county council formally came into being on 1 April 1889. It held its first official meeting on 4 April 1889 at County Hall in Preston, the courthouse (completed 1882) which had served as the meeting place for the quarter sessions which preceded the county council. John Tomlinson Hibbert, a Liberal who had previously been the Member of Parliament for Oldham, was appointed the first chairman of the council.[8]
In 1974, the Local Government Act 1972 abolished the administrative county of Lancashire and reconstituted the county as a non-metropolitan county. There were some significant changes to its territory, notably ceding significant areas in the south to Greater Manchester and Merseyside and in the north to Cumbria, whilst gaining more modest areas from Yorkshire to the east. Blackburn, Blackpool, Burnley and Preston were also brought into the non-metropolitan county, losing their former independence from the county council. The lower tier of local government was reorganised as part of the same reforms. Previously it had comprised numerous boroughs, urban districts and rural districts; they were reorganised into 14 non-metropolitan districts.[9]
In 1998 two of the districts, Blackburn with Darwen and Blackpool, were both made unitary authorities, making them independent from the county council, leaving 12 districts within the non-metropolitan county.[10]
Since the last boundary changes in 2017 the council has comprised 84 councillors representing 82 electoral divisions. Most divisions elect one councillor, but two divisions elect two councillors each. Elections are held every four years.[36]
The council is based at County Hall on Fishergate in Preston. The original part of the building was a courthouse completed in 1882, which also served as the meeting place for the quarter sessions which preceded the county council. The building became the meeting place for the county council on its creation in 1889 and was significantly extended in 1903 and 1934 to provide additional office space.[37]
County Library
Lancashire adopted the Public Libraries Act, 1919, in 1924. Library services were slow to develop as the average ratable value of the area outside the county boroughs and the other local authorities which had already adopted the act was relatively low. In 1938/39 the average expenditure on urban libraries per head was 1s. 9d., but that on county libraries was only 8 1/4d. (about two fifths of the former amount). Another disadvantage was that government of libraries was by a libraries sub-committee of the education committee of the council (the librarian having to report to the education officer who might not have been sympathetic to libraries). The central administration of the county library is at Preston where there are special services, special collections and staff to maintain a union catalogue.[38]
Biological heritage sites
"Biological heritage sites" are, according to Lancashire County Council, "'local wildlife sites' in Lancashire...(that) are identified using a set of published guidelines."[39] The published guidelines dictate the necessary parameters in which a piece of land can be properly considered a "biological heritage site" by the "(Lancashire) County Council, Wildlife Trust for Lancashire, Manchester and North Merseyside and Natural England."[39][40]
August 31, 1903 (arms) October 26, 1903 (supporters)
Crest
On a Wreath of the Colours a Lion passant guardant proper charged on the body with a Mascle Gules and resting the dexter forepaw on an Escocheon of the above said Arms.
Escutcheon
Gules three Piles two issuant from the chief and one in base Or each charged with a Rose of the field barbed and seeded proper.
Supporters
On either side a Lion proper gorged with a Collar Vair pendent therefrom an Escucheon of the Arms viz. Gules three Piles two issuant from the chief and one in base Or each charged with a Rose Gules barbed and seeded proper.
Motto
Latin: In consilio consilium, lit.'In council is wisdom'
1 2 Youngs, Frederic (1991). Guide to the Local Administrative Units of England: Volume 2. London: Royal Historical Society. pp.683–686. ISBN0861931270.
↑ "Compositions Calculator". The Elections Centre. University of Exeter. Retrieved 21 May 2025. (Put "Lancashire" in search box to see specific results.)
↑ Cotton, G. B. (1971) "Public libraries in the North West"; North Western Newsletter; Manchester: Library Association (North Western Branch), no. 116: Libraries in the North West, pp. 5-24 (p. 8)
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