Local Government

Parish councils like Streatley form the bottom tier of the local government system in rural areas which in general has three layers (County Council, District Council and Parish Council). But in the former county of Berkshire there are only two layers since it has been split up into a number of Unitary Authorities which combine the functions of a County Council and a District Council. Streatley parish is within the area of West Berkshire Unitary Authority.

Duties

Councils have a small number of duties which they are bound to carry out and a much greater number of powers, which are defined in Local Government Acts and many other statutes, which they may choose to employ where they are suited to a council’s circumstances, but which are not mandatory.

On the other hand, since parish councils are statutory corporations, they can only in general do things which they are expressly permitted to do by statute with a minor exception in that they are empowered (under Section 137 of LGA 1972) to spend up to a prescribed amount in any one year (currently about £8 per elector) for the benefit of all or some inhabitants of the area

This situation is changing with the introduction of the power for ‘eligible’ parishes to promote well-being as set out in LGA 2000 Section 2, but this is not likely to be of much benefit to small rural parishes such as Streatley.

Powers

Many of the powers permitted by statute are not relevant to Streatley and the Parish Council has employed only a relatively small subset of those powers, the main ones being related to:-

  • the running costs of the Council (Clerk’s salary, admin costs, insurances, hire of meeting rooms etc)
  • provision and maintenance of street lighting
  • grass cutting and maintenance work at the Recreation Ground and other public open spaces
  • maintenance of play equipment, notice boards, signs and benches and the provision of new or replacement equipment as appropriate
  • making grants towards the upkeep of the Morrell Room and the Graveyard and towards projects brought forward under the Parish Plan.
Planning
The Parish Council is a statutory consultee as regards planning applications - it investigates all applications and makes recommendations to West Berkshire Council and this important function does take up a considerable amount of Council time. However, the final decision on planning applications rests with WBC rather than with the Parish Council.
Roads and Highways

The Parish Council is also active in promoting the case for improvements to roads and highway safety but once again the decision on what is to be done rests with WBC rather than the Parish Council.

Sources of Income

In the last few years a new source of income has become available to the Parish Council by way of transfers from WBC to the Council of developers’ contributions. This can only be used for capital projects. This has been supplemented by grants from WBC and external bodies for work under the Parish Plan. This has involved the Council, in conjunction with the Parish Plan/Action Plan Team, in a great deal of planning and management activity.

© Streatley Parish Council