What Local Authorities do

While the history of local government in Wales stretches back at least to the 16th Century, the existing 22 Welsh unitary authorities date from 1996. These are not divided into county and district councils, but exist as one single "unitary" tier, providing all local government services to local communities.

There are over 1200 councillors in Wales and elections are held every four years. They spend around £4 billion per year on their services and employ 150,000 people. Approximately 80% of the funding comes via the Welsh Assembly Government, with the remaining 20% made up from the council tax.

Local authorities have two broad roles:

• Community leadership – to lead, influence and support partner organisations to work to common goals to meet the needs and aspirations of their communities

• Delivering a wide range of personal, community and environmental services for individuals and whole communities

Councils provide three types of services to their communities:

1. Statutory services (that they must provide), such as social care, housing, education, refuse collection, planning, transport and highways, community safety and fire and rescue services

2. Regulatory services (that they must provide). As the name suggests these are services relating to regulating aspects of the external environment such as environmental health, development control, trading standards and licensing

3. Discretionary services (that they may choose to provide), such as tourism, culture and leisure services

Councils provide some services directly, work in partnership with other organisations, and commission others to provide services on their behalf. Third sector organisations are crucial partners in local authority service provision, both in terms of providing access to citizens voices to inform service design and delivery and as service providers in their own right.

It is important to understand how local authorities are structured, in order to understand how decisions are made and therefore how you can begin to influence the decision making process. Click here to find out more about this.