Parish Councils

Search for your Parish Council On-line
List of Parish Chairman, Clerks and meeting times.(PDF Format).

Why do we have Parishes?
A Parish is the most local tier of administration and the first tier of democratic government. 

What is a Parish?

There are two sorts of parishes, whose boundaries do not always coincide. These are:

• the Ecclesiastical Parishes centred on an Anglican church with a parochial church council chaired by the vicar or rector; and
• the Civil Parishes that are part of local administration.

A Civil Parish is an independent, local democratic unit for villages and smaller towns, and for the suburbs of the main urban areas.  Each Parish has a Council which is a small local authority. Its councillors are elected for four years at a time in the same way as for other councils. Bye-elections may be held to fill vacancies occurring between elections. The council is the corporation of its village and each year the councillors choose a Chairman from amongst their number.

What powers have Parish Councils to do things for their areas?

Parish Councils have more formal powers to do things than are often suspected.  They monitor street lighting, they can provide allotments, look after play areas and village greens. They have a hand in communications by maintaining or guarding such things as rights of way, bus shelters and public seats.  They can also be involved in the provision of halls and meeting places.  They provide village newsletters, guides or leaflets to newcomers - they make village surveys. 

Many provide car and cycle parks and others provide public conveniences, litterbins and public seats. They can also prosecute noisemakers or litter bugs. Many appoint charitable trustees and school governors. Very often a cemetery is managed by the Parish Council. They have the power to improve the quality of village life by spending sums of money on things, which, in their opinion, are in the interests of the parish or its inhabitants.

The Parish Council can do these things by actually providing them itself or by helping others (such as volunteers or a charity) financially to do them.  Parish Councils thrive on volunteers.  Parish Councils are the cheapest and least bureaucratic kind of local authority.  They are funded by a small part of the Community Charge and get no general government grant, so they have every incentive to ensure that they give and get value for money.

Who controls the Parish Council?

The elected Chairman controls the business of a Parish Council meeting.  The Parish Clerk, who is the Council’ s Chief Executive, takes the Minutes, carries out the approved policies of the Council and ensures the accounts are strictly kept and audited every year. 

Some of our Parish Councils provide their own website::
 

Parish Council meetings are open to the public and an Assembly Meeting for all parish electors has, by law, to be held every year in April or May.

Parish Reviews
Parish boundaries are regularly reviewed by District councils under the auspices of the Local Government Boundary Commission.  The aim is to help ensure that parish boundaries correspond to the social communities in which people live.

Parish Council Toolkit
The Association of Council Secretaries and Solicitors have recently produced a toolkit for Parish Councils which is designed to assist Parish Clerks in ensuring good governance within their Parish Councils. The toolkit can be downloaded here.

Community Led Planning

Community Led Planning is where the local community create a vision for a parish area or town and produce a plan to help achieve it.

The resulting vision often covers the social, economic, environmental and cultural well-being of the community and all those who live and work there.

• Parish Council Toolkit (April 2009) (664 KB)
• Parish Contacts List (148 KB)

Newark and Sherwood District Council
Kelham Hall
Kelham
Newark
Nottinghamshire
NG23 5QX

Telephone : 01636 655248

Fax : 01636 655233

Email : corporate@nsdc.info

Last updated : 31/08/2010 14:20:41