The Small Authority in the Welfare State

Abstract

The Local Government Act of 1888 established county councils and county borough councils, and these councils continue to this day. Territorially they are very much the same as sixty-four years ago, but the duties entrusted to them then have been greatly increased from time to time by amplification and addition. The last ten years have seen the strongest challenge to the pre servation of the territorial and administrative functions of the units relatively small in population and financial power, but they survive, and, in point of fact, have become full major local authorities for the protective and welfare services required by Parliament to be provided in what has become known as the Welfare State. Four years have passed since this striking change of fortune, and this paper sets out to take stock of the general performance so far achieved and the apparent trend of public opinion in favour of tried local government. If the stocktaking, by reason of the character of this occasion, is confined mainly to welfare services, there is full appreciation of the fact that there are other fields of onerous importance in which Parliament has also turned to the same major local authorities for the administrative services required.