Walsall Council

The town of Walsall was an ancient borough. It also had a mayor from at least 1377. The town's claim to be a borough was not supported by a charter, leading to disputes with the lord of the manor. A formal charter was eventually issued in 1627.^[3][4] The borough was reformed to become a municipal borough in 1836 under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, which standardised how most boroughs operated across the country. It was then governed by a body formally called the 'mayor, aldermen and burgesses of the borough of Walsall', generally known as the corporation, town council or borough council.^[5]

When elected county councils were established in 1889, Walsall was considered large enough to provide its own county-level services, and so it became a county borough, independent from the new Staffordshire County Council, whilst remaining part of the geographical county of Staffordshire. The borough was enlarged in 1966 to take in Darlaston and Willenhall.^[6]

The modern metropolitan borough and its council were established in 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972, as one of seven boroughs in the new metropolitan county of the West Midlands. The new borough covered the combined area of the old county borough of Walsall plus the neighbouring Aldridge-Brownhills Urban District.^[7] The metropolitan district was awarded borough status from its creation, allowing the chair of the council to take the title of mayor, continuing Walsall's series of mayors dating back to the fourteenth century.^[8] The council styles itself Walsall Council rather than its full formal name of Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council.^[9]

From 1974 until 1986 the council was a lower-tier authority, with upper-tier functions provided by the West Midlands County Council. The county council was abolished in 1986 and its functions passed to the county's seven borough councils, including Walsall, with some services provided through joint committees.^[10]

Since 2016 the council has been a member of the West Midlands Combined Authority, which has been led by the directly elected Mayor of the West Midlands since 2017. The combined authority provides strategic leadership and co-ordination for certain functions across the county, but Walsall Council continues to be responsible for most local government functions.^[11][12]

Walsall Council provides metropolitan borough services. Some strategic functions in the area are provided by the West Midlands Combined Authority; the council appoints two of its councillors to sit on the board of the combined authority as Walsall's representatives.^[13] There are no civil parishes in the borough.^[14]

The council meets at the Council House on Lichfield Street, which had been completed in 1905 for the old borough council.^[58] It replaced the earlier Guildhall on High Street, which had been built in 1867 on a site which had been occupied by the town's guildhall from the fifteenth century.^[59] The council's main offices are in the Civic Centre on Darwall Street, which is linked to the Council House by a bridge over Darwall Street.^[60]

Since the last boundary changes in 2004, the council has comprised 60 councillors representing 20 wards, with each ward electing three councillors. Elections are held three years out of every four, with a third of the council (one councillor for each ward) being elected each time for a four-year term of office.^[61]