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The Redcliffe-Maud Report (Cmnd. 4040) was published in 1969 by the Royal Commission on Local Government in England, under the chairmanship of Lord Redcliffe-Maud. Although the commission's proposals were broadly accepted by the Labour government, they were set aside by the Conservative government elected in 1970.
The commission was appointed on 7 June 1966, with the following terms of reference:
"....to consider the structure of Local Government in England, outside Greater London, in relation to its existing functions; and to make recommendations for authorities and boundaries, and for functions and their division, having regard to the size and character of areas in which these can be most effectively exercised and the need to sustain a viable system of local democracy; and to report." [1]
The members of the commission were Redcliffe-Maud (chairman), John Eveleigh Bolton (vice-chairman), Derek Senior, Sir James William Francis Hill, Victor Grayson Hardie Feather, Arthur Hedley Marshall, Peter Mursell, John Laurence Longland, Reginald Charles Wallis, Thomas Dan Smith and Dame Evelyn Adelaide Sharp. [1] [2]
Broadly the report recommended the abolition of all existing county, county borough, borough, urban district and rural district councils, which had been created at the end of the 19th century, and replacing them with new unitary authorities. These new unitary authorities were largely based on major towns, which acted as regional employment, commercial, social and recreational centres and took into account local transport infrastructure and travel patterns.
There were to be 58 new unitary authorities and three metropolitan areas (Merseyside; South East Lancashire/North East Cheshire or 'Selnec'; and West Midlands), which were to be sub-divided into lower tier metropolitan districts. These new authorities, along with Greater London, were to be grouped into eight provinces, each with its own provincial council.
In arriving at their recommendations, the commissioners were guided by a number of principles which they had themselves devised. These included:
Accordingly, the different categories of council would have the following powers and responsibilities:
It had originally been envisaged that parish councils should also be abolished, but the Secretary of the National Association of Parish Councils (NACP), Charles Arnold-Baker, convinced the commission that they should be preserved.[ citation needed ]
The commission was nearly unanimous, with some reservations as to the exact geographic details. One member of the commission, Derek Senior, dissented entirely from the proposals, and put forward his own in a memorandum of dissent (Cmnd. 4040-I), which was slightly larger than the report itself. He would have preferred a two-tier system, with 35 city-regions of varying size, along with 148 districts. These were to be further grouped into five provinces. At a lower level, there would be 'common councils', roughly equivalent to civil parish councils, which would also cover communities within large towns; special arrangements were to be made for the area surrounding Berwick-upon-Tweed. These proposals effectively ignored traditional boundaries, to a much greater extent than the Report itself did.
Immediately after the report was published, the Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, said that he accepted the recommendations "in principle" and committed the government to "press ahead quickly" on the legislation necessary to implement it, later clarifying that legislation would probably follow in the 1970–71 or 1971–72 parliamentary session. [4] The Labour Party Government issued a white paper entitled "Reform of Local Government in England" (Cmnd 4276) in February 1970, broadly accepting the recommendations of the report. The Government had however added two new metropolitan areas: West Yorkshire (with the five Bradford/Leeds/Halifax/Huddersfield/Mid-Yorkshire unitaries as districts), and South Hampshire based on the Southampton and Portsmouth unitaries, with the Isle of Wight being a separate district. [5]
Observers felt that the Conservative Party, then in opposition, had no urgency in defining their position. The shadow spokesman Peter Walker did not commit himself but instead held a series of regional conferences to ascertain party grassroots opinion. Reports suggested these conferences were overwhelmingly hostile and the Conservative Party conference in 1969 passed a highly critical motion, while suggesting that some reform of local government was supported. Walker decided that a future Conservative government could not implement Redcliffe-Maud, but refused to disown the report completely. [6]
The Rural District Councils Association was immediately opposed to the proposals which would see their members subsumed in much larger authorities. They started a national campaign with the slogan "Don't Vote for R.E. Mote" (with Mr R.E. Mote depicted as an insensitive bureaucrat), [7] distributing material to all their members. The slogan was used on postal franking from the affected authorities. Swale Rural District Council was forced to opt out of the campaign due to the similarity of "R.E. Mote" with the local Conservative prospective parliamentary candidate R.D. Moate. [8] By coincidence, Moate had moved the motion opposing Redcliffe-Maud at the Conservative Party conference. [9]
When the Conservatives won the 1970 general election, they did so on a manifesto committed to a two-tier system in local government. [10] In 1971 a further white paper entitled "Local Government in England: Government Proposals for Reorganisation" (Cmnd 4584) announced its intentions, which ultimately led to the 1974 re-organisation. Although the general plan of the report was abandoned, many of the specific innovations were carried over, such as the plan to associate Slough with Berkshire, and Bournemouth with Dorset.
In the actual 1974 re-organisation, the three metropolitan areas became metropolitan counties, though their area was greatly reduced. A further three were added, covering the Leeds/Bradford area (West Yorkshire), the Sheffield/Rotherham area (South Yorkshire) and the Tyneside area (Tyne and Wear). The concept of authorities based around Bristol (Avon), and Teesside (Cleveland) was also retained. In most areas though, the 1974 system was far more conservative and retained more traditional boundaries.
The situation of wholly two-tier government did not last. The county councils for the metropolitan counties were abolished in 1986 by Margaret Thatcher's government, making the metropolitan boroughs effectively into unitary authorities. A further set of reforms in the 1990s led to the re-establishment of many old county boroughs as unitary authorities, along with other areas.
In 2004 the Government put forward a proposal to introduce directly-elected regional assemblies in the three regions of Northern England, should referendums produce a 'yes' vote (in the event the first region voted 'no' overwhelmingly, and the other referendums were abandoned). The regional boundaries proposed were very similar to the three northern Redcliffe-Maud provinces. Associated with this reform would have been a move to wholly unitary local government in the affected regions. In the area of Cumbria and Lancashire, the proposals bore a striking resemblance to the ones in the Report.
| Province | Number | Unitary / metropolitan area | Metropolitan district | Approximate extent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| North East | 1 | Northumberland | non-metropolitan Northumberland | |
| 2 | Tyneside | Tyne and Wear minus Sunderland | ||
| 3 | Durham | ceremonial County Durham minus Easington | ||
| 4 | Sunderland & East Durham | Sunderland and Easington | ||
| 5 | Teesside | former non-metropolitan county of Cleveland plus Whitby etc. | ||
| Yorkshire | 6 | York | non-metropolitan North Yorkshire and York minus Harrogate, Craven, Whitby | |
| 7 | Bradford | Bradford, Craven | ||
| 8 | Leeds | Leeds, Harrogate | ||
| 9 | Halifax | Calderdale | ||
| 10 | Huddersfield | Kirklees minus the north-eastern area around Batley and Dewsbury | ||
| 11 | Mid Yorkshire | Wakefield plus bordering areas of Kirklees such as Batley and Dewsbury | ||
| 12 | Sheffield & South Yorkshire | Sheffield, Rotherham, Barnsley plus the Dronfield area of Derbyshire | ||
| 13 | Doncaster | Doncaster | ||
| 14 | North Humberside | ceremonial county of East Riding of Yorkshire, small part of North Yorkshire | ||
| 15 | South Humberside | North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire | ||
| North West | 16 | Cumberland & North Westmorland | Carlisle, former Cumberland, area around Appleby in Westmorland | |
| 17 | Furness & North Lancashire | Barrow-in-Furness, South Lakeland and Lancaster | ||
| 18 | The Fylde | Blackpool, Fylde, Wyre | ||
| 19 | Preston-Leyland-Chorley | Preston, South Ribble, Chorley | ||
| 20 | Blackburn | Blackburn with Darwen, Hyndburn, Ribble Valley | ||
| 21 | Burnley | Burnley, Pendle, Rossendale | ||
| 22 | Merseyside Metropolitan Area |
| Merseyside, plus the districts of West Lancashire, Halton, Ellesmere Port and Neston, Chester and part of Vale Royal. | |
| 23 | Selnec Metropolitan Area |
| Greater Manchester, plus the northern part of Cheshire. | |
| West Midlands | 24 | Stoke & North Staffordshire | Stoke-on-Trent, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire Moorlands, Stafford, East Staffordshire, Congleton and Crewe and Nantwich | |
| 25 | West Midlands Metropolitan Area |
| County of West Midlands, excluding Coventry, plus Wyre Forest, Bromsgrove, Redditch, Tamworth, Litchfield, South Staffordshire, Cannock Chase and the area around Stafford. | |
| 26 | Shropshire | Shropshire (including Telford and Wrekin) | ||
| 27 | Hereford & South Worcestershire | Herefordshire and southern Worcestershire, excluding the districts of Wyre Forest, Bromsgrove and Redditch | ||
| 28 | Coventry & Warwickshire | Warwickshire including Coventry | ||
| East Midlands | 29 | Derby & Derbyshire | Derbyshire minus Dronfield and Glossop plus Burton upon Trent | |
| 30 | Nottingham & Nottinghamshire | Nottinghamshire | ||
| 31 | Leicester & Leicestershire | Leicestershire, and most of Rutland | ||
| 32 | Lincoln and Lincolnshire | non-metropolitan county except for South Holland and the areas around Bourne and Stamford | ||
| South West | 33 | Cornwall | Cornwall minus Saltash and area | |
| 34 | Plymouth | Plymouth, the southern half of West Devon, the western part of South Hams and the area around Saltash in Cornwall | ||
| 35 | Exeter & Devon | Devon except the southern half of West Devon and the western part of South Hams | ||
| 36 | Somerset | non-metropolitan county of Somerset except the area around Frome | ||
| 37 | Bristol & Bath | the former county of Avon, plus the adjacent parts of Wiltshire and the area around Frome | ||
| 38 | North Gloucestershire | the non-metropolitan county of Gloucestershire | ||
| 39 | Wiltshire | ceremonial county of Wiltshire except the northern part of West Wiltshire and the western part of North Wiltshire | ||
| 40 | Bournemouth & Dorset | the ceremonial county of Dorset except the area around Sherborne, plus the western half of New Forest | ||
| East Anglia | 41 | Peterborough – North Fens | the districts of Peterborough, Fenland and South Holland, plus the areas around Bourne, Stamford, Oundle and Ramsey | |
| 42 | Cambridge – South Fens | the districts of Cambridge, East Cambridgeshire and South Cambridgeshire, plus the areas around Newmarket, Saffron Walden, Haverhill, Royston, Huntingdon and St. Ives | ||
| 43 | Norwich & Norfolk | Norfolk, except a small area to the west, plus the district of Waveney | ||
| 44 | Ipswich, Suffolk & North East Essex | Suffolk except the areas around Newmarket and Haverhill, plus the districts of Colchester, Tendring and the northern part of Braintree | ||
| South East | 45 | Oxford & Oxfordshire | non-metropolitan Oxfordshire minus Henley-on-Thames, plus Brackley | |
| 46 | Northampton & Northamptonshire | non-metropolitan Northamptonshire minus the areas around Brackley and Oundle | ||
| 47 | Bedford & North Buckinghamshire | Bedford and Milton Keynes, plus the areas around Buckingham and Ampthill | ||
| 48 | Mid-Buckinghamshire | Chiltern and Wycombe plus the areas around Aylesbury and Tring | ||
| 49 | Luton & West Hertfordshire | Dacorum except Tring, St Albans, Watford, Three Rivers, Hertsmere except Potters Bar, Luton and South Bedfordshire | ||
| 50 | East Hertfordshire | Broxbourne, East Hertfordshire, Welwyn Hatfield, Stevenage, Harlow, North Hertfordshire except Royston, the western halves of Epping Forest and Uttlesford and the areas around Biggleswade and Sandy | ||
| 51 | Essex | ceremonial county of Essex minus Colchester, Harlow and Tendring, the western areas of Epping Forest and Uttlesford and the area around Saffron Walden | ||
| 52 | Reading & Berkshire | non-metropolitan Berkshire plus Henley and the southern part of Buckinghamshire | ||
| 53 | West Surrey | Spelthorne, Elmbridge, Runnymede, Surrey Heath, Woking, Guildford, Waverley, Rushmoor, Hart and the northern part of East Hampshire | ||
| 54 | East Surrey | Epsom and Ewell, Mole Valley, Reigate and Banstead, Tandridge and Crawley | ||
| 55 | West Kent | the western half of the current ceremonial county | ||
| 56 | Canterbury & East Kent | the eastern half of the current ceremonial county | ||
| 57 | Southampton & South Hampshire | the districts of Southampton, Eastleigh, Test Valley, the northern part of Winchester and the eastern part of New Forest | ||
| 58 | Portsmouth, South East Hampshire and Isle of Wight | the Isle of Wight, the districts of Fareham, Gosport, Portsmouth, Havant and the southern parts of Winchester and East Hampshire | ||
| 59 | West Sussex | Arun, Adur, Chichester, Horsham and Worthing | ||
| 60 | Brighton & Mid-Sussex | Brighton and Hove, Mid Sussex and Lewes | ||
| 61 | East Sussex | Eastbourne, Hastings, Rother and Wealden |
Greater London was outside the scope of the report, having been reorganised in 1965 under the London Government Act 1963.
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