All posts in the topic Headington Civil Parish Council (Short link)
Summary
- There are 4 posts — by 3 authors — in this topic.
- Latest post made by nicholas fell at Sep 01 10:11 UTC
I had the idea of starting a new Civil Parish Council after reading on
Stephanie's Headington History Website that a member of the Mattock family had
been on the Headington Civil Parish Council back in the nineteen twenties, it
ran between 1894 and 1927 when it disappears from the records, but it appears
that the original paperwork for it are filed at the local records office at
Between Towns Road.
The circumstances are somewhat peculiar as to what happened to the Civil Parish
Council. i shall post more on this in the next few days.
Some of us have been "campaigning" (more like nagging) for this for many years, and in fact now that the City Council appears to want to dissolve their area committees, or so I am led to believe, it seems like a good time to push for it more - reparishing the whole city to replace the area committees. I have a feeling (though no doubt someone on here will know more) that the previous Headington PC disappeared when it became part of Headington Urban District Council (so it was still a local affair), a short lived body before it was incorporated into Oxford City (in about 1938 was it?). I would prefer now for us to think in terms of a town council (same "tier" of government as a parish, really just a different name) covering roughly the area covered by the present North East Area Committee. But that would definitely need delicate negotiations with the two existing parish councils in the area (Old Marston and Risinghurst & Sandhills) as I know for a start that OMPC had concerns about losing their identity when I mentioned the idea to them ten years ago or so when we started thinking about the city's ward boundary changes. The elections manager at the City Council always winces a bit when I go into his office in case I'm there to talk about reparishing the city - as he had a "difficult" time negotiating how to re-ward and redraw Risinghurst and Sandhills a few years back! I was recently at Thame Town Council explaining Community Land Trusts to them and it was clear that, as an independent devolved body, they seem more willing to stand up to their district council for their community than a "branch meeting" of that larger body could ever really do (apart from anything real devolution needs the money in the form of the parish precept to give them real independence of thought). Such a Headington and Marston Town Council would have a population far bigger than Thame, and a much bigger economy, and, as you rightly point out, we have had such independence before, within living memory, both as a parish and an urban district. Almost anything a principal authority can do can be devolved to a third tier authority, including things like Section 42 roads maintenance, leisure (indeed in the era of "public baths" that was quite a considerable responsibility - though in Headington I believe that sort of thing was dealt with by the "Public Health Board" separately) and, since the City Council seems determined to take back centralised micromanagement of planning decisions whether or not they get away with dissolving the branch committees, it would at least guarantee a democratic local forum as a statutory consultee on planning issues. Nowadays I could even imagine making a case for responsibility for the local schools under a sort of a "Parish Academy" type arrangement if that were popular. How about Bury Knowle House as the Headington Mairie? I wrote about it recently here: http://www.jockcoats.org.uk/oxford_labours_double_devolution and a longer while ago here: http://risinghurst.blogspot.com/2006/03/power-to-parish.html We have the highest ratio of electors to elected representatives in developed democracies. It is quite fundamental to changing the way our politics works to start from the ground up rather than the top down: http://www.jockcoats.org.uk/revolutionary_liberalism_5_sovereign_individual and http://www.jockcoats.org.uk/haris_game_not_even_right_ballpark
Just to put the history straight:
Headington Parish Council was still going strong in 1927, with fifteen local
worthies as its members. At that time the three Headington villages were not
part of the city of Oxford.
In 1927 Headington Urban District Council (UDC) was formed at the request of
the parish council, and replaced it. This had eighteen members (nine members
for Old Headington & Quarry Ward, and nine for Highfield Ward -- many of them
the same people who had been on the parish council). It met fortnightly at the
Workhouse on the London Road.
In 1928/9 Headington (1,529 acres) was incorporated into the City of Oxford
along with Cowley. Once it was a suburb of Oxford, it lost its sovereignty and
came under the control of the City Council.
So Headington UDC was very short-lived: it was founded in 1927 and dissolved in
August 1929.
Stephanie is slightly out with her facts surrounding the old Parish Council in
that it was not replaced by either the Urban District Council or the Rural
District Council as they were stand alone entities split off from the Civil
Parish Council. There was also the Headington Registration District as well.
Things are also complicated by the fact that Headington is too all intents and
purposes a Royal Borough to this day, as the Royal Borough title is tied into
St Andrews Old Headington being a Royal Peculiar Church. It is a
Constitutional Statute like the 1689 Bill of Rights Act. You can't undo one
without undoing the other.
There was the City Corporation before there was the present City Council, and
plus there was the Municipal Borough of Oxford as well, before the County
Council ever existed. I have this morning spoken to Angela Cristofoli about
Jocks claims that the City Council want to dissolve the Area Committees, that
was not the story she gave me, so i think it could be said that Jock in typical
Lib Dem style has jumped the gun, angela told me that she had seen some long
range planning discussion documents for changes to the Area Committees but that
the Area Committee in the short term are staying around, and that there is
nothing solid of any substance on the table yet.