Exercise 1. Read the following text.
The local government system of Britain gives significant and extensive power to local people, elected by their fellow-citizens and directly accountable to them. Local authorities take many crucial decisions that affect the well-being of their community as a whole and of the individuals and families who form that community.
Local authorities are at the heart of local communities, providing services that everyone uses, and benefits from, at different times of their lives. Many public services, such as housing, education, personal social services, the police and the fire services, are provided by democratically elected local authorities throughout Britain. Local authorities derive their power from legislation. In some cases ministers have powers to secure some national uniformity in standards in order to safeguard public health or to protect the rights of individual citizens.
Local authority councils consist of elected councillors, elected on a similar basis to parliamentary elections. They are paid a basic allowance but may also be entitled to additional allowances and expenses for attending meetings or taking on special responsibilities. Councillors serve for four years.
In England the boundaries and electoral arrangements of local authorities are kept under review by the Local Government Commission.
To stand for election, candidates must either be registered as an elector or have some other close connection within the electoral area of their candidature, such as their principal place of employment. Councillors are paid a basic allowance, but may also be entitled to additional allowances and expenses for attending meetings or for taking on special responsibilities.
Councillors cannot do the work of the council themselves, and so are responsible for appointment and oversight of officers, who are delegated to perform most tasks. Local authorities nowadays have to appoint a Chief Executive Officer, with overall responsibility for council employees, and who operates in conjunction with department heads.
Over 2 million people are employed by local authorities in Great Britain. These include administrative, professional and technical staff, teachers, firefighters, those engaged in law order services and manual workers. Education is the largest service, employing some 40 per cent of all local government workers.
Local government employees are called neither civil servants nor public servants. They are called local service officers.
Local government in Britain is structured in two contrasting ways. In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and in parts of England, a single all-purpose council is responsible for all the functions. (These councils are also referred to as single-tier or unitary councils.) The rest of England has a two-tier system, in which two separate councils divide the responsibilities. Parish, town and community councils represent a lower tier of local government with very restricted powers.
There are five different types of local authority: county and district councils, London boroughs, metropolitan districts and unitary authorities. There are 387 local authorities in England. London boroughs, metropolitan boroughs, and unitary authorities are single-tier councils with full responsibility for all local authority services in their area. In many non-metropolitan areas of England there is a two- tier system with the county councils providing the bulk of large-scale services such as education and social services and the district council providing other services such as housing.
Councils such as districts, counties and unitaries are known as principal local authorities in order to differentiate them in their legal status from parish and town councils, which are not uniform in their existence. Local councils tend not to exist in metropolitan areas but there is nothing to stop their establishment.
