County Borough of Bury

Bury
Bury Town Hall
Area
• 1911	5,907 acres (23.90 km2)
• 1961	7,433 acres (30.08 km2)
Population
• 1901	58,029
• 1971	67,870
History
• Created	1846
• Abolished	1974
• Succeeded by	Metropolitan Borough of Bury
Status	Improvement Commissioners District 1846–1876 Municipal borough 1876–1889 County borough 1889–1974
• HQ	Bury Town Hall
• Motto	Vincit Omnia Industria (Industry overcomes all things)

Bury was a local government district centred on Bury in the northwest of England from 1846 to 1974.

Under the Bury Improvement Act 1846 a board of twenty-seven improvement commissioners was formed for Bury. The Improvement Commissioners District was enlarged in 1872. A charter of incorporation dated 9 September 1876 created the town a municipal borough and it was further extended in 1885.

Under the Local Government Act 1888 Bury was constituted a county borough. This meant that it was independent of Lancashire County Council, exercising both the powers of a borough and county council. However, Bury remained in Lancashire for judicial and other purposes such as lieutenancy and shrievalty. The county borough was extended in 1911 when it gained the Warth area from Radcliffe Urban District and in 1933 when it absorbed much of the dissolved Bury Rural District.

The County Borough of Bury was abolished by the Local Government Act 1972 and its territory transferred to Greater Manchester to form the central part of the Metropolitan Borough of Bury.

On incorporation the borough was divided into five wards: Church, Redvales, East, Moorside and Elton. The corporation consisted of a mayor, ten aldermen and thirty councillors, with six councillors and one alderman returned for each ward. On the extension of the borough in 1933 the size of the borough council was increased to thirty-three councillors and eleven aldermen. In 1969 wards were reorganised and the council increased in size to thirty-six councillors and twelve aldermen.

The members elected to the early borough council did not use political labels. However, by 1901 the borough was under the control of the Liberal Party. In 1904 Conservatives and Liberal Unionists gained a majority. In the following year the first Labour councillors were elected. The council was under no overall control (although generally with a pro-Conservative administration) until 1937. In that year Conservatives gained an overall majority, which it held until 1945. The Labour Party briefly held power in 1946–1947. The council returned to Conservative control in 1947, and the party was in control for twenty-one of the next twenty-five years, and was the largest party for the remainder of the period. At the final election of the council in 1972 Labour took control.

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