City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council is the local authority of the City of Bradford in West Yorkshire, England. It is a metropolitan district council, one of five in West Yorkshire and one of 36 in the metropolitan counties of England, and provides the majority of local government services in Bradford. Since 1 April 2014 it has been a constituent council of the West Yorkshire Combined Authority.

History

In 1974, City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council was created to administer the newly formed metropolitan borough. The county borough of Bradford was merged with the Borough of Keighley, the Urban Districts of Baildon, Bingley, Cullingworth, Denholme, Ilkley, Shipley and Silsden, along with part of Queensbury and Shelf Urban District and part of

Skipton Rural District Skipton was a rural district in the West Riding of Yorkshire from 1894 to 1974. It was named after Skipton, which constituted an urban district on its southern border. The district was expanded in 1937 by taking in the parishes of Steeton with ...

by the

Local Government Act 1972 The Local Government Act 1972 (c. 70) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales on 1 April 1974. It was one of the most significant Acts of Parliament to be passed by the Heath Gov ...

. The Council, which is based at Bradford City Hall in Centenary Square, governs the whole metropolitan district. The city was granted the right on 18 September 1907 to elect a Lord Mayor. The district is divided into 30 Electoral Wards, each ward electing three Councillors. Elections are held in May, where one third of the 90 seats (one for each ward) are contested and the successful candidate is elected for a period of four years. In March 2006, the UK's Audit Commission issued a report "in the public interest" regarding concerns about the

procurement process Procurement is the method of discovering and agreeing to terms and purchasing goods, services, or other works from an external source, often with the use of a tendering or competitive bidding process. When a government agency buys goods or ser ...

for the acquisition of an

asset management Asset management is a systematic approach to the governance and realization of value from the things that a group or entity is responsible for, over their whole life cycles. It may apply both to tangible assets (physical objects such as buildings ...

system. The report identified weaknesses in the Council's programme management and procurement processes, which the Council accepted "without reservation". At the local elections in 2015, Labour won 17 of the 30 seats available to hold majority of the Council – on 46 of 90 seats. In the local elections of 2021, the

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation ...

won Tong Ward which previously had been a Labour stronghold, having only elected Labour councillors since the formation of Bradford Council. Three Conservative councillors—Joan Clarke, Robert Hargreaves and Luke Majkowski—left their party to sit as independents in 2021 and 2022, citing internal issues in the local branch of the Conservative Party. In the local elections of 2022, the

became the joint third largest party on Bradford Council with the Liberal Democrats winning three seats - although they won 14% of the total votes across the district compared to 8% for the Liberal Democrats.

Parliamentary representation

The council is currently covered by five constituencies with six wards in each constituency:

Bradford East Bradford East is a United Kingdom constituencies, constituency represented in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, UK Parliament since 2015 United Kingdom general election, 2015 b ...

, Bradford South,

Bradford West Bradford West is a List of United Kingdom Parliament constituencies, constituency represented in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, UK Parliament since 2015 United Kingdom gene ...

, Keighley and Shipley.

Wards and Councillors

Each ward is represented by three councillors. * 2020 election postponed until

2021 File:2021 collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: the James Webb Space Telescope was launched in 2021; Protesters in Yangon, Myanmar following the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, coup d'état; A civil demonstration against the October–November 2021 ...

due to coronavirus pandemic

Political Makeup Since 2012

References

External links