REDCLIFFE-MAUD REPORT

The 'Redcliffe-Maud Report' (Cmnd. 4040) is the name generally given to the report published by the Royal Commission on Local Government in England 1966-1969 under the chairmanship of The Rt. Hon. Lord Redcliffe-Maud.
The commission was given the task of looking at the then structure of local government in England and making recommendations for change. It excluded Greater London, which had been re-organised in 1965.
The members of the Commission were Redcliffe-Maud (chair), J. E. Bolton (vice-chair), Derek Senior, Francis Hill, Victor Feather, A. H. Marshall, P. Mursell, J. L. Longland, R. C. Wallis. T. Dan Smith and Dame Evelyn Sharp.^[1]

Contents

The report

Dissent

Aftermath

Proposed Unitary Areas

Proposed Metropolitan Areas

Merseyside

Selnec

West Midlands

References

The report

Broadly the report recommended the abolition of all the 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.
The then Labour Party Government broadly accepted the recommendations of the report, and put out a White Paper (Reform of Local Government in England, Command 4276) in February 1970. This 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.^[2]
The Conservative Party won the 1970 general election. The new Government was committed to a two-tier system, and in 1971 announced its intentions, which lead 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.

Dissent

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. At a lower level, there would be 'common councils', roughly equivalent to civil parish councils, which would also cover communities within large towns. These proposals effectively ignored traditional boundaries, to a much greater extent than the Report itself did.

Aftermath

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 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 bear a striking resemblance to the ones in the Report.

Proposed Unitary Areas

Province	Number	Unitary authority	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
	11	Mid Yorkshire	Wakefield
	12	Sheffield & South Yorkshire	Sheffield, Rotherham
	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
	23	Selnec metropolitan area
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
	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 Glossop plus Burton upon Trent
	30	Nottingham & Nottinghamshire	Nottinghamshire
	31	Leicester & Leicestershire	Leicestershire, and most of Rutland
	32	Lincoln and Lincolnshire	non-metrpolitan 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	Peterborourgh-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 (as at present)

Proposed Metropolitan Areas

Merseyside

(Merseyside, plus the districts of West Lancashire, Halton, Ellesmere Port and Neston, Chester and part of Vale Royal)

★ Southport-Crosby (the districts of West Lancashire and Sefton, except Bootle County Borough)

★ Liverpool (the district of Liverpool, the western part of Knowsley and Bootle County Borough)

★ St Helens-Widnes (the districts of St Helens, Halton and the eastern part of Knowsley)

★ South Merseyside (The districts of Wirral, Ellesmere Port and Neston, Chester and part of Vale Royal)

Selnec

(South East Lancashire - North East Cheshire)
(Greater Manchester, plus the northern part of Cheshire)

★ Wigan-Leigh (district of Wigan)

★ Bolton (district of Bolton, plus part of Blackburn with Darwen)

★ Bury-Rochdale (districts of Bury and Rochdale)

★ Warrington (district of Warrington and part of Vale Royal)

★ Manchester (district of Manchester, part of Salford, part of Trafford)

★ Oldham (district of Oldham)

★ Altrincham-Northwich (southern part of district of Trafford, Vale Royal and western part of Macclesfield)

★ Stockport (district of Stockport, eastern part of Macclesfield and adjacent areas of Derbyshire)

★ Ashton-Hyde (district of Tameside, plus areas around Glossop)

West Midlands

(County of West Midlands, excluding Coventry, plus Wyre Forest, Bromsgrove, Redditch, Tamworth, Lichfield, South Staffordshire, Cannock Chase and the area around Stafford.

★ Mid-Staffordshire ( the districts of Tamworth, Lichfield, Cannock Chase, the northern part of South Staffordshire and the area around Stafford)

★ Wolverhampton (as current district, plus the middle part of South Staffordshire)

★ Walsall (as current district)

★ Dudley (as current district except Halesowen, plus southern part of South Staffordshire

★ West Bromwich-Warley (the district of Sandwell plus Halesowen)

★ Birmingham (as current district plus Solihull)

★ North Worcestershire (the districts of Wyre Forest, Bromsgrove, Redditch)

References

1. Authorities should have freedom to decide priorities. The Times. June 12, 1969.
2. ''Action is on lines proposed by Redcliffe-Maud''. The Times. February 5, 1970.