Milton Keynes City Council | |
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Third of council elected three years out of four | |
Type | |
Type | |
History | |
Founded | 1 April 1974 |
Leadership | |
Mayor of Milton Keynes | Mohammed Khan, Labour since 20 May 2020 |
Leader of the Council | |
Chief executive | Michael Bracey since 26 October 2018 |
Structure | |
Seats | 57 councillors |
Political groups |
|
Meeting place | |
Civic Offices, 1 Saxon Gate East, Milton Keynes, MK9 3EJ | |
Website | |
milton-keynes | |
Footnotes | |
Labour Party and Liberal Democrats coalition administration |
Milton Keynes City Council is the local authority of the City of Milton Keynes in Buckinghamshire, England. It is a unitary authority, having the powers of a non-metropolitan county and district council combined. The city is divided into 19 wards, electing 57 councillors.
The 'Milton Keynes District' was created on 1 April 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972, by the merger of Bletchley Urban District, Newport Pagnell Urban District and Wolverton Urban District, together with Newport Pagnell Rural District and that part of Winslow Rural District within the designated New Town area. The council was formed under the same act as the Milton Keynes District Council, subsidiary to Buckinghamshire County Council. The council was first elected in 1973, a year before formally coming into its powers and prior to the creation of the District of Milton Keynes on 1 April 1974. In 1974, the council gained borough status, entitling it to be known as Milton Keynes Borough Council and to annually appoint a (ceremonial) Mayor of Milton Keynes. [2] [3]
It was envisaged through the Local Government Act 1972 that Milton Keynes as a non-metropolitan district council would share power with the then Buckinghamshire County Council (now Buckinghamshire Council). This arrangement lasted until 1997 when the district council gained responsibility for services that had previously been provided for Milton Keynes by the county council. On 1 April 1997, following a recommendation of the Local Government Commission for England, the Borough became a self-governing Unitary Authority, [4] and the council renamed itself Milton Keynes Council.
The local council derives its powers and functions from the Local Government Act 1972 and subsequent legislation. For the purposes of local government, Milton Keynes is within a non-metropolitan area of England. In its capacity as a district council it is a billing authority collecting Council Tax and business rates, it processes local planning applications, it is responsible for housing, waste collection and environmental health. In its capacity as a county council it is a local education authority and is responsible for social services, libraries and waste disposal. The council also appoints members to Buckinghamshire Fire and Rescue Authority and the Thames Valley Police and Crime Panel, both of which serve the borough.
One third of the council is elected each year for three years, followed by one year without election. Since 1996 political control of the council has been held by the following parties: [5]
Party in control | Years |
---|---|
Labour | 1996–2000 |
No overall control | 2000–2002 |
Liberal Democrats | 2002–2006 |
No overall control | 2006–2021 |
Labour and Liberal Democrat coalition | 2006–2021 |
From May 2014 to May 2021, the Labour Party held office as a minority administration. Since May 2021, the administration is a Labour Party and Liberal Democrats coalition.
In recent years, the Council has promoted the Milton Keynes urban area as a test-bed for experimental urban technologies. One of these projects is the LUTZ Pathfinder pod, an autonomous (self-driving) vehicle built by the Transport Systems Catapult. Trials took place in Milton Keynes in 2016. [6] [7]
Milton Keynes Council has two logos:
The first logo was the oak leaf which was used since the 1990s.
The second logo is more colourful than the previous version and consists of the two letters M and K representing Milton Keynes. The 'M' is coloured in azure and 'K' is coloured in green: this is the logo that is currently in use.
The headquarters of the Council and the Council chamber is the Civic Offices building at 1 Saxon Gate East. The building dates from 1979 and was designed by architects Faulkner Brown. [8] The building is sited very close to the moot mound (meeting place) of the Anglo-Saxon Sigelai (or Secklow) Hundred. [9]
A metropolitan borough is a type of local government district in England. Created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972, metropolitan boroughs are defined in English law as metropolitan districts within metropolitan counties. All of metropolitan districts have been granted or regranted royal charters giving them borough status. Metropolitan boroughs have been effectively unitary authority areas since the abolition of metropolitan county councils by the Local Government Act 1985. Metropolitan boroughs pool much of their authority in joint boards and other arrangements that cover whole metropolitan counties, such as city regions or combined authorities, with most of the latter having a metro mayor.
The City of Milton Keynes is a unitary authority and borough, with the status of a city, in the ceremonial county of Buckinghamshire. It is the northernmost district of the South East England Region. The borough abuts Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and the remainder of Buckinghamshire.
Newport Pagnell is a town and civil parish in the City of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. The Office for National Statistics records Newport Pagnell as part of the Milton Keynes urban area.
Astwood is a village in the unitary authority area of the City of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. It is located on the border with Bedfordshire, approximately 6 miles (9.7 km) east of Newport Pagnell and 7 miles (11 km) west of Bedford.
The Borough of Wellingborough was from 1974 to 2021 a non-metropolitan district and borough in Northamptonshire, England. It was named after Wellingborough, its main town, but also included surrounding rural areas.
A non-metropolitan county, or colloquially, shire county, is a county-level entity in England that is not a metropolitan county. The counties typically have populations of 300,000 to 1.8 million. The term shire county is, however, an unofficial usage. Many of the non-metropolitan counties bear historic names and most, such as Wiltshire and Staffordshire, end in the suffix "-shire". Of the remainder, some counties had the "-shire" ending but have lost it over time, such as Devon and Somerset.
Newport Pagnell was a rural district in the administrative county of Buckinghamshire, England, from 1894 to 1974, covering an area in the north-east of the county.
Non-metropolitan districts, or colloquially "shire districts", are a type of local government district in England. As created, they are sub-divisions of non-metropolitan counties in a two-tier arrangement. Non-metropolitan districts with borough status are known as boroughs, able to appoint a mayor and refer to itself as a borough council.
Metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties are one of the four levels of subdivisions of England used for the purposes of local government outside Greater London and the Isles of Scilly. As originally constituted, the metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties each consisted of multiple districts, had a county council and were also the counties for the purposes of Lieutenancies. Later changes in legislation during the 1980s and 1990s have resulted in counties with no county council and 'unitary authority' counties with no districts. Counties for the purposes of Lieutenancies are now defined separately, based on the metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties.
Central Milton Keynes is the central business district of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England and a civil parish in its own right, with a town council.
Buckinghamshire County Council was the upper-tier local authority for the administrative county and later the non-metropolitan county of Buckinghamshire, in England, the United Kingdom established in 1889 following the Local Government Act 1888. The county council's offices were in Aylesbury.
Milton Keynes North is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since the 2019 United Kingdom general election by Ben Everitt, a Conservative.
The unitary authorities of England are those local authorities which are responsible for the provision of all local government services within a district. They are constituted under the Local Government Act 1992, which amended the Local Government Act 1972 to allow the existence of counties that do not have multiple districts. They typically allow large towns to have separate local authorities from the less urbanised parts of their counties and originally provided a single authority for small counties where division into districts would be impractical. However the government has more recently proposed the formation of much larger unitary authorities, including a single authority for North Yorkshire, the largest non-metropolitan county in England, at present divided into seven districts.
The Local Government Commission for England was the body responsible for reviewing the structure of local government in England from 1992 to 2002. It was established under the Local Government Act 1992, replacing the Local Government Boundary Commission for England. The Commission could be ordered by the Secretary of State to undertake "structural reviews" in specified areas and recommend the creation of unitary authorities in the two-tier shire counties of England. The Commission, chaired by John Banham, conducted a review of all the non-metropolitan counties of England from 1993 to 1994, making various recommendations on their future.
This history of Milton Keynes details its development from the earliest human settlements, through the plans for a 'new city' for 250,000 people in northern Southeast England, its subsequent urban design and development, to the present day. Milton Keynes is the largest settlement and only city in Buckinghamshire, founded in 1967. At the 2011 census, the population of its urban area was estimated to have reached almost 230,000.
Wolverton Urban District was a local government district in Buckinghamshire, England, from 1920 to 1974, covering the town of Wolverton and its environs, including the town of Stony Stratford. A district covering this area existed from 1894 to 1974, but was initially a rural district called Stratford and Wolverton Rural District. It was redesignated an urban district in 1919, briefly being called Stratford and Wolverton Urban District before being renamed Wolverton Urban District in 1920.
Newport Pagnell Urban District was a local government district in the administrative county of Buckinghamshire, England, from 1897 to 1974.
Bletchley Urban District was an urban district covering the town of Bletchley in the administrative county of Buckinghamshire, England from 1911 to 1974. The district had been created in 1895 as Fenny Stratford Urban District, being renamed to Bletchley Urban District in 1911.
Milton Keynes Borough Council is the local authority for the Borough of Milton Keynes, a unitary authority in Buckinghamshire, England. Until 1 April 1997 it was a non-metropolitan district.
(2) A new county shall be constituted comprising the area of Milton Keynes and shall be named the county of Milton Keynes.