Preserved counties of Wales

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Preserved counties of Wales are the current areas used in Wales for ceremonial purposes such as Lieutenancy. They are based on the counties created by the Local Government Act 1972 and used for local government and other purposes between 1974—1996.

Preserved counties of Wales

The Local Government (Wales) Act 1994 abolished the 8 ceremonial counties created by the Local Government Act 1972. However, it created the concept of preserved counties based on their areas, to be used for purposes such as Lieutenancy. [1] In addition to this ceremonial function, the Boundary Commission must avoid crossing preserved county borders when drawing up Parliamentary constituencies, where practicable. ^[1]

The preserved counties were originally almost identical to the 1974—1996 counties, but with a few minor changes intended to ensure preserved counties were composed of whole principal areas. Llanrhaedr-ym-Mochant, Llansilin and Llangedwyn were transferred from Clwyd to Powys, and Wick, St Brides Major, Ewenny and Pentyrch were transferred from Mid Glamorgan to South Glamorgan. However, these changes still left two county boroughs, Conwy and Caerphilly split between preserved counties.

In order to rectify this, the Preserved Counties (Amendment to Boundaries) (Wales) Order 2003 made two changes of substance to the boundaries. These changes came into effect on April 2, 2003. The part of the local government area of Conwy which had been in Gwynedd was transferred to Clwyd, and the part of the local government area of Caerphilly which had been in Mid Glamorgan was transferred to Gwent. The boundary between Mid Glamorgan and South Glamorgan was also re-aligned to reflect small changes in local government boundaries. Each Preserved county now encompasses between 1 and 5 whole local government areas.