The third election to the Greater London Council was held on 9 April 1970 and saw a Conservative victory with a reduced majority.

Electoral arrangements

New constituencies to be used for elections to Parliament and also for elections to the GLC had not yet been settled, so the London boroughs were used as multi-member 'first past the post' electoral areas . Westminster was joined with the City of London for this purpose. Each electoral area returned between 2 and 4 councillors.

Results

In addition to the 100 councillors, there were sixteen

Aldermen An alderman is a member of a municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council member chosen by the elected members the ...

who divided 11 Conservative and 5 Labour, so that the Conservatives actually had 76 seats to 40 for Labour following the election. With an electorate of 5,524,384, there was a turnout of 35.2%. Labour recovered from its mauling three years previously, but did so primarily in working-class areas. Consequently, relatively few seats changed hands: Labour won back Camden,

Greenwich Greenwich ( , ,) is a town in south-east London, England, within the ceremonial county of Greater London. It is situated east-southeast of Charing Cross. Greenwich is notable for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich ...

, Hammersmith,

Lewisham Lewisham () is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified in the London Plan as one of ...

Wandsworth Wandsworth Town () is a district of south London, within the London Borough of Wandsworth southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London. Toponymy Wandsworth takes its nam ...

, and one seat in Lambeth. The results did enable Labour to take back control of the

Inner London Education Authority The Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) was an ad hoc local education authority for the City of London and the 12 Inner London boroughs from 1965 until its abolition in 1990. The authority was reconstituted as a directly elected body corp ...

and were one of the factors used by

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...

Harold Wilson in deciding to call a general election soon after. Among those who were first elected to the GLC in 1970 were Tony Banks (Labour, Hammersmith, later Minister for Sport) and Sir George Young (Conservative, Ealing, later a cabinet minister under John Major). The election is also significant as it was at a meeting in support of the Conservative candidates in Lambeth that John Major met Norma Johnson, who became his wife. ¹ These parties were created by a group of students standing in

Haringey The London Borough of Haringey (pronounced , same as Harringay) is a London borough in North London, classified by some definitions as part of Inner London, and by others as part of Outer London. It was created in 1965 by the amalgamation of ...

, who declared that they intended to make a mockery of the election.

By-elections 1970–1973

No seats changed hands in byelections during this term. The Conservatives retained Kensington and Chelsea on 2 December 1971 after the death of Seton Forbes-Cockell, and Barnet on 19 October 1972 after the death of Arthur Peacock. Labour retained

on 15 June 1972 after the death of Sir Norman Prichard. No seats were vacant at the end of the term.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Greater London Council Election, 1970 1970 in London 1970 English local elections

1970 Events January * January 1 – Unix time epoch reached at 00:00:00 UTC. * January 5 – The 7.1 Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (''Extreme''). Between 10,000 and ...

April 1970 events in the United Kingdom