Lesson video

Hi, y'all.

My name's Mrs. Tomassi, and I'm gonna be working through with you on your citizenship lesson today.

So if you check, make sure you've got everything that you need and you're all good to go, and then we can make a start.

Today's lesson title is How is local government structured? And that's forms part of the unit on Where does power reside in the UK? So hopefully today the outcome is that you'll be able to describe the branches of local government and the different roles within it.

We will make a start by looking at the keywords.

There's three keywords today, and make sure you look out for 'em.

They'll be in bold through the lesson.

If you ever need to, you can refer back to 'em here.

So we've got local government, and that is a system of government that operates at a local level providing services to its community.

We've got local councillor who's a person elected to represent their ward or division and the people who live in it.

They provide a bridge between the community and the council.

And then we've got council officer, who is often those with specialist knowledge who work for the council, support local councillors to make decisions for their local area.

As I said, if you keep an eye out for them throughout, and you'll see them in bold.

So today's lesson, there are two learning cycles.

So we're gonna make a start with the first one, which is what are the different types of local councils? Here we have got a diagram.

Any ideas what this diagram is? If you could work out, it's the power that is distributed in the UK through different branches.

So it starts there with national or central government, and we've got regional and local government that we are focusing on today.

Power does also get devolved to other national governments, and devolved is transferring some of those powers.

So we've got the national governments there.

I'll give you an example.

Jacob's saying, "Scotland don't pay for university tuition fees like the rest of the UK." So there are some differences there.

What we are gonna focus on today is the differences in local government.

Now, the local government also get some powers that are devolved.

And we've got Laura there saying, "There are 317 local governments or authorities across England." So when we talk about some of these powers being devolved, there is a lot of places that this power is going to.

So to start with there, we've got a map, and the map shows the types of local governments in England.

You'll see there are four different colours because there are four main types.

We are gonna cover these throughout the lesson, so don't worry if you don't know them now.

Hopefully by the end you will have an idea what they are.

So we've got there the purple, which there are less of and they're the metropolitan boroughs.

You've then got the two-tier counties in red, the unitary authorities in green, and the London boroughs in orange.

So at any point through the lesson when we start referring to some of these terms and you wanna go back and have a look, you can have a look at the different areas, you can try and find where you are and your area and what is represented there as well.

We'll make a start.

In order to talk about those four different types, it is good to know that they are divided into two sections.

So we're gonna make a start here with this one first.

In some parts of the country, there's just one tier of local government that provide all the local services, and they are called single-tiers.

Now, there are three types of single-tiers that we are gonna look at, which are unitary authorities, London borough councils, and metropolitan borough councils.

So they sit there.

Now, through this lesson, local government can be a little bit confusing because there are lots of different types and different areas have different types of local government.

So you might see some more checks for understanding just to help you understand and know these different types of government.

So the first check for understanding, which single-tier local government is missing from the diagram? So you've got their metropolitan borough councils and London borough councils.

Which one is missing? Did you manage to work out? That is unitary authorities missing from the diagram.

We are gonna go through this now.

So again there, that map specifically shows you the unitary authorities.

Thinking before we even start, the word uni, have you heard that before? It might help to think of it like a unicycle.

How many wheels has that got? It's only got one wheel.

So that's like unitary.

It means one or single.

It can help in this when you're thinking it's single-tier, so there's only one.

So then in terms of local government, it is one council providing all the local services.

So that's things like public transport, education.

There are at the moment 62 unitary authorities, plus the Isle of Scilly, and North Yorkshire is the largest one.

This could change though because actually as we talk about local government and the structure, it is still evolving, it has evolved, and it continues to evolve, so that it might change in the future, which is something to bear in mind.

The next type of single-tier we've got is London borough councils.

So London boroughs, you've got 32 London boroughs, and what it means is each borough is a single-tier.

So each of them 32 boroughs as a single-tier, and their local council provides most of their day-to-day stuff.

However, a little bit different is that they have the Greater London Authority and they have some of the strategic services.

So things like the fire, they've got the London Fire Brigade, the Met Police, and the Transport for London.

So that's why it's a little bit of an exception, it's a little bit different to a full unitary authority.

Then you've got the metropolitan borough councils, which, again, we are looking at the large cities.

So if we are thinking about the amount of people that they're dealing with, it's a higher population.

And as of 2025, there are 36 metropolitan boroughs, which includes Birmingham, Leeds, Liverpool, and Manchester.

So you're thinking of big cities, it's probably a metropolitan borough, but same thing, it's, you know, single-tier and they are providing the services.

Another check for understanding now.

Which of the following are single-tier local governments? Is it A, unitary authorities, B, London boroughs, C, metropolitan borough councils? Little bit of a trick there because it is all three of them.

Hopefully you've got that and you are happy to move on.

So we've looked at single-tier, and now we're gonna look at two-tiers.

Now, obviously if we're thinking single is one, two obviously means two.

So these ones are split.

So that diagram there shows you a little bit.

So they start two-tier, you've got county council there, and then just below the county council, you've got the district council.

Now, what it means is they're just different responsibilities and they are in charge of different things, which we will look at in more detail.

So the county council provides a service that cover the entire county.

Yeah, so county, I think obviously the whole county, and it tends to be more of the strategic functions.

So things like the fire, social services, education, libraries, waste management, they're overseeing the whole area, which might be a very big area.

And then what happens is that you've got district councils.

Sometimes if you live in an area, you might know it as a borough council or a city/town council, and they sit under the county council, and what they're doing is they're providing the local services.

So if you've got a large county, it might be split, and it would all come under the same county, but there would be lots of different boroughs within it.

And that borough would be in charge of their local leisure facilities in that area, refuge collection, environmental health, services like that.

Check for understanding again.

Finish the sentence.

The two-tiers in some councils are called.

It is county councils and district councils.

Obviously, of course, you can say borough or town/city councils as well.

Now, just to make it a little bit more complicated, there are also sometimes parish councils.

Now, the reason there's not a space for them in the diagram is because they don't sit exactly in a single or two-tier.

They sit on their own.

And they are, a lot maybe smaller areas, so such as villages or parts of the towns and cities, and they overlap with the other local councils.

So it could be part of a single-tier, it could be part of a two-tier, but they might handle specific like community buildings or parks, maybe events in the area, you know, example like maybe they run litter picking in the area.

So them kinds of activities would sit with the parish council.

So fill in the missing word.

Parish councils with all other local councils.

It is overlap.

They don't sit completely there.

And also not everywhere has a parish council.

That moves us onto the first task.

Now, the first task is really important.

It's just about helping to remember the local government and the different terms and tiers and words, because when we talk about local government, again, you know, there's 317 in England, there are lots of different ways of doing things, so it's just making sure you've got them different key terms and knowledge there.

You've got the keywords to include in your diagram, and you are going to draw the diagram, the structure of the local government, including single and two-tier councils.

When you've done that, see if you can explain the difference between a single and two-tier local government.

Take some time now, draw it out as you wish, whatever way is gonna help you to remember the different structure, and then when you are finished, you can unpause and we can go through it together.

How did you get on with that? Hopefully you managed to get each type of council in the right place.

And so we had the single and the two-tiers and which ones go in.

Which then, did you manage to explain the difference? So your answer could look like this.

A single-tier local government, such as unitary authorities, means there is only one level of government that handles all local services, like education, transport, and housing.

And then a two-tier has two levels, a higher level, such as county council, that deals with the bigger issues, and lower levels, such as district or borough, town, city, that handles more local concerns.

Now, hopefully, if you've managed to get the difference between that, we can move on and start to have a look at some of the other roles in the local council.

These roles that we're gonna look at are gonna be relevant to all the different boroughs and councils.

So the leaders in the councils are called local councillors.

Now, local councillors are voted in by local residents or the constituents and it's their job to represent the local people.

So when you have local elections, each person will vote for the representative in their area.

So that in mind, if you're thinking actually there are 317 local authorities in England, so how many local councillors do we reckon there might be in the UK? That's what Jacob is asking there.

Now, Sam says, "There are about 17,000 local councillors just in England." So that is a lot of representatives and a lot of people.

Now, each council has many local councillors as they are all divided up in smaller areas, and the smaller areas are called wards, and then everybody would get to in that ward or in that area would get to vote and have a councillor represent them.

Now, councils vary in size because there's are differences in population.

So the number of local councillors varies too.

For example, you've got here, so as of 2025, this is correct, we've got Birmingham city that have got over 100 local councillors, where you've got Rutland which has only got 27.

So this varies in the different areas that you are.

It might be worth having a look at your local council.

You can see what type of council it is and have a look at some of your local councillors, how many you've got in your area, and how it works.

Check for understanding now.

True or false? Each local government has the same number of local councillors representing them.

That is false.

Why is that false? Because they're different sizes.

So the local government is structured based on the size, and therefore then you have the local councillors to reflect that.

As we were saying, they represent people in their ward, in their areas, and how they do this is by providing community leadership in the area.

They are looking to the local area.

They're helping the council to create policies and services that serve the needs of residents.

So if that's park, schools, roads, whatever is necessary in that area, they are there to support the policies in there.

They're there to listen to the residents and the people that they are representing and attend and speak at meetings to discuss issues, plan projects, and vote on important matters.

They also have other roles as well.

So they might take part in planning and licencing decisions.

So that's things, if you see, you know, a new building come up or someone wants to turn a premises into, let's say, a restaurant, they would go for planning permission and the local councillors would take part in that as well.

They are looking to promote the interest of their community and support local events and projects in the community.

So which of the following are roles of the local councillor? Is it A, helping the council create policies, B, listening to the constituents concerns, C, attending council meetings? It is all three.

To become a councillor, all you need is to be over 18, British/Commonwealth citizen, and have lived, worked, or own property in the area that you wish to be a councillor for.

Now, councils are diverse, and people come from all different backgrounds.

They can be affiliated to a political party or they can be independent.

It doesn't matter.

And they also might have worked in different jobs.

So they might be at the beginning of their journey or they might be right at the end.

The important thing to note is actually local councillors aren't paid a wage for what they do.

So they are given a small allowance rather than a full-time salary.

And because of the transparency in the system, you should be able to go onto the local council's website or the area that you are looking at and see what those allowances are.

So a lot of local councillors do have second jobs, as well as their councillor role, because they're not actually getting their full-time wage, and they also might choose to volunteer as well.

True or false? Local councillors are elected in by constituents in their ward.

That is true.

There are different ways of running local governments, but most opt for a leader and cabinet model.

Have you heard of the word cabinet before? And if we're thinking about in terms of central democracy, where have you heard that? It does run similar to national government in that sense, that the local councillors elect a leader for four years and they appoint a cabinet of local councillors who sit on the front benches.

Now, that cabinet member might be responsible for a different area and they lead on a portfolio.

So examples, things like children, families, and lifelong services, environment, health and wellbeing.

So each local councillor that is put onto the cabinet would have one of those portfolios to lead on.

Now, the number of members in the cabinet does vary between local governments, 'cause, again, there's different areas, different services that are provided.

If we go back to the structure of the government, of the local governments, so it is the same in terms of the cabinet.

It might vary dependent on each area.

Again, you can find out on your local one by having a look on their website.

Now, if a local councillor is not part of the cabinet, then they're known as a backbench local councillor.

So a bit like the House of Commons where you've got the backbenches, it's the same here.

And it just means they don't have a specific role in the council.

They are still responsible for representing their constituents.

They were still elected in, and they still there to speak up and ask questions on behalf of constituents and attend the meetings.

Check for understanding now.

So fill in the missing gaps with the correct council role.

Mm, have portfolios and lead on areas within the council.

Do not have a specific role within the council but attend all meetings.

That's the local councillors, and they would be part of the cabinet.

These are the backbench councillors who do not have a specific role.

Local councillors are responsible for the entire council area, but they may not have specialist knowledge in every field.

Again, like the politicians, they've been elected to represent.

It doesn't mean that they know all the information about all the different areas.

Now, what the local government does is they have council officers who are there to make the informed decisions and provide expert advice and support.

They might specialise in a specific subject.

The council officers then assist the local councillors.

Even if they have different views on the local community, the council officer is there to support with their expert advice.

The council officers aren't elected.

They are employees and they work for the local council.

That means that they do get a wage, but they are politically neutral because they're just been paid to specialise and to do their job and support the local councillors.

So give you an example, there might be council officers for education, planning, housing, and although local councillors and the council officers work together for the same aim, so they're both there to support the residents, their roles, salaries, and accountability are different from each other.

So if you think back, the local councillors are getting an allowance, they don't have a wage, whereas a council officer, that is probably then gonna be their main wage.

Now, council officers support.

So to give you a bit of an example to show you the link between the two and how they work, if a housing development is being planned, is the council officer that will research the area, the plans, and what the impact would be.

The council officer would then give their expert opinion to the local councillor.

The local councillor then makes the decision.

And it is the council officer that carries out and finalises the decision and makes it happen.

So they will see it through to the end.

So they will be there behind the scenes working through and completing it.

Can you match the role to the description? So council cabinet member, backbench local councillor, and council officer.

So the council cabinet member leads the portfolio on an area, so such as environment.

It's the backbench local councillor does not have a specific role, but attends all council meetings.

And it is the council officer that is the employee of the council with the specialist knowledge.

So it's good to remember because although the local councillor and the council officer work together, their roles are very much separate, and it's remembering what their roles are.

A good way to remember it is that the council officer is the employee.

So they're employed by the council.

Whereas the local councillor is elected by the constituents.

We will now have a look at the role of the mayor.

Now, that hasn't been spoken about yet, and you might be thinking, "Oh, well, I live in an area and I'm sure I've got a mayor." That might be the case.

Now, on the whole, the mayor is there to be like ceremonial.

So, again, if you think, you know, like the monarch's role is mostly ceremonial in parliament, that's like the role the mayor takes in local government, so they're the figurehead, but they can't make decisions about council business.

However, obviously just to confuse you a little bit, there are some authorities that have something called a directly-elected mayor.

And what that means is when they have been directly elected in, they can make decisions.

So it's just, if you do find in your area, you're like, "Oh yeah, I have got a mayor," you might wanna have a look and see whether they are directly elected in or not 'cause that would impact what they could do.

To give you an example, places that have directly elected mayors are Manchester and Yorkshire.

You've got the mayor of London as well that is directly elected in.

So they have a little bit of a different role.

Just to throw another term in there as well, they are sometimes called metro mayors, but that is directly-elected mayors, and that just means that they have the responsibility and can make decisions for their areas.

Just to ensure there's no confusion there, quick check for understanding.

So true or false? All mayors are involved in making decisions for their local area.

That's false.

Why is it false? Generally, the role of the mayor is ceremonial.

There are some directly-elected mayors or metro mayors, and they are the ones that can make decisions.

Now, that moves us onto our final task.

We've got part one here, which is to identify which role each person in the local council has.

So either they're gonna be a backbench local councillor, a cabinet member, a council officer, or a mayor.

Can you work out which one they are? And when we specified mayor there, you're thinking of the ceremonial mayor.

If you take some time, work 'em out and then come back and we can check them before moving on to the next task.

How did you find that? So we've got that first one there.

"My job's to put council decisions in place, and I'm not elected by voters." Hopefully that should have been the clue that they are a council officer 'cause they are employees of the council.

You've then got, "I don't have a specific role, but I still manage to help my constituents get a social space for teenagers by speaking up at local council meetings." And that is the backbench local councillor.

You've then got the person leading on community safety in the area and fought for a new pedestrian crossing.

That's the cabinet member.

And obviously they've been given a portfolio which is on community safety.

And then we've got the mayor that chairs the decisions but doesn't get involved in the decisions.

And that would be a ceremonial mayor, the metro mayor, or a directly-elected mayor would be able to.

Now we're gonna move on to the second and third part of the task.

So here, can you suggest two benefits of using elected citizens to make decisions about council services? And then when you've done that, what is an advantage of having council officers work alongside local councillors? If you take your time now, you can pause, see how you get on, come up with your answer, and then we will feed back.

How was that? You could have suggested that councillors are elected by the public, and if they don't do a good job, the voters or the electorates can vote for someone else to represent them.

They know a lot about the area that they serve because they either work or live in that area and talk frequently with members of the public.

Then for the third part, an advantage of having council officers work alongside local councillors, you could have suggested that council officers are employed members, so they're gonna have a lot more time to work on the issues and support local councillors who might have to work an additional job because the local councillors obviously are only getting an allowance, so they might not have the formal time.

They might also be busy with other constituents and talking with residents, et cetera, in the area.

They also have specialist knowledge in areas within the council, so the local councillor, that can ask them for advice and guidance from them, which will allow 'em to be more efficient so they have somebody that has the knowledge that they can fall back and ask questions to.

And that brings us to the end of this session.

Hopefully you can now describe the structure and some of the roles within local government.

I think it's also important, if you go away and you want to have a look, you can find out more specifically about your area.

You might have leaflets through the let box or you might see posters around your local area that you live in.

That gives you a bit more an idea and see if you can find out whether you live in a single or two-tier structure and what type of council it is that you live in.

Now, if we are just gonna summarise what we've done today, so local governments are structured in different ways.

They follow either a single or two-tier structure.

Unitary authorities, metropolitan and London borough councils are single-tier.

County and district councils are two-tiers.

Parish councils are smaller and overlap.

Roles in the council include the local councillor, who could also be a cabinet member or a backbench councillor.

And the council officer is not elected.

The mayor's role is mostly ceremonial.

So that finishes it off.

Hopefully you are gonna go away and have a look at your own local area and see how your local government is structured 'cause that would help to embed what you have learned in this session as well.

Thank you for working with me today, and I hope you enjoy the rest of your day.