Badenoch and Strathspey is a former district of

Highland Highlands or uplands are areas of high elevation such as a mountainous region, elevated mountainous plateau or high hills. Generally speaking, upland (or uplands) refers to ranges of hills, typically from up to while highland (or highlands) is ...

region, Scotland. The district was created under the

Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 The Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 (c. 65) is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom that altered local government in Scotland on 16 May 1975. The Act followed and largely implemented the report of the Royal Commission on Local Gove ...

as one of the eight districts of the Highland region. The same legislation abolished

counties A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesChambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

and

burgh A burgh is an autonomous municipal corporation in Scotland and Northern England, usually a city, town, or toun in Scots. This type of administrative division existed from the 12th century, when King David I created the first royal burghs. Burg ...

s as local government areas, and the Badenoch and Strathspey district was formed by combining the areas of (in the county of Inverness) the burgh of

Kingussie Kingussie ( ; gd, Ceann a' Ghiùthsaich ) is a small town in the Badenoch and Strathspey ward of the Highland council area of Scotland. Historically in Inverness-shire, it lies beside the A9 road, although the old route of the A9 serves as the ...

and the district of

Badenoch Badenoch (from gd, Bàideanach, meaning "drowned land") is a traditional district which today forms part of Badenoch and Strathspey, an area of Highland Council, in Scotland, bounded on the north by the Monadhliath Mountains, on the east by th ...

with (in the county of Moray) the burgh of

Grantown-on-Spey Grantown-on-Spey ( gd, Baile nan Granndach) is a town in the Highland Council Area, Counties of Scotland, historically within the county of Moray. It is located on a low plateau at Freuchie beside the river Spey at the northern edge of the Cairng ...

and the district of

Cromdale Cromdale ( gd, Cromdhail, from ''crom'' 'crooked' and ''dal'' 'valley, dale') is a village in Strathspey, in the Highland council area of Scotland, and one of the ancient parishes which formed the combined ecclesiastical (later civil) parish o ...

.Schedule 1, Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 (c. 65) ''as enacted''. The traditional area of

Strathspey Strathspey may refer to one of the following: * Strathspey, Scotland, an area in the Highlands of Scotland * Strathspey Camanachd Strathspey Camanachd is a shinty club based in Grantown-on-Spey, Strathspey, Scotland, currently competing in the ...

was thus divided between the Highland region and the

Grampian Grampian ( gd, Roinn a' Mhonaidh) was one of nine former local government regions of Scotland created in 1975 by the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 and abolished in 1996 by the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994. The region to ...

region. In 1996, under the

Local Government etc (Scotland) Act 1994 The Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994 (c. 39) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which created the current local government structure of 32 unitary authorities covering the whole of Scotland. It abolished the two-tier st ...

, the Highland Region became the Highland

Council Area {{Unreferenced, date=May 2019, bot=noref (GreenC bot) A council area is one of the areas defined in Schedule 1 of the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994 and is under the control of one of the local authorities in Scotland created by that Act. ...

and the districts were abolished. The Highland Council (in law a new and different entity), as the successor authority, then adopted the areas of the former districts as management areas and created area committees to represent them. The Badenoch and Strathspey management and committee areas consisted of five out of the 72 Highland Council

ward Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a pris ...

s. Each ward elected one councillor by the

first past the post In a first-past-the-post electoral system (FPTP or FPP), formally called single-member plurality voting (SMP) when used in single-member districts or informally choose-one voting in contrast to ranked voting, or score voting, voters cast their ...

system of election. In 1999, however, ward boundaries were redrawn but management area boundaries were not. As a result, area committees were named for, and made decisions for, areas which they did not exactly represent. The new Badenoch and Strathspey committee area consisted of five out of the 80 new Highland Council wards. New wards were created for elections in May 2007, under the

Local Governance (Scotland) Act 2004 The Local Governance (Scotland) Act 2004 (asp 9) is an Act of the Scottish Parliament which provided, amongst other things, for the election of councillors to the local authorities in Scotland by the single transferable vote system. The Commissi ...

. As the wards became effective for representational purposes, the Highland Council's management and committee structures were re-organised. The Badenoch and Strathspey management area and the Badenoch and Strathspey area committee were therefore abolished. The new wards are much larger, each electing three or four councillors by the

single transferable vote Single transferable vote (STV) is a multi-winner electoral system in which voters cast a single vote in the form of a ranked-choice ballot. Voters have the option to rank candidates, and their vote may be transferred according to alternate p ...

system; Badenoch and Strathspey is now a single ward, electing four of the council's 80 members, and a ward management area within the council's new Inverness, Nairn and Badenoch and Strathspey corporate management area. The new corporate area is one of three covering the council area. It consists of nine of the 22 wards of the council area, and the nine wards elect 34 of the council's members.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Badenoch And Strathspey Politics of Highland (council area) Highland council wards

See also

References