The Royal Commission on the Amalgamation of the City and County of London was a royal commission which considered the means for amalgamating the ancient City of London with the County of London, which had been created in 1889. The commission reported in 1894.Young, K. & Garside, P., Metropolitan London: Politics and Urban Change, (1982) The government headed by Lord Rosebery accepted the recommendations of the commission, but when a Conservative government under Lord Salisbury came to power in 1895 the reforms were almost entirely abandoned.
Background The administration of the metropolitan area of London, and the possible reform of the ancient City of London had been prominent political topics since the 1830s. Recommendations by royal commissions given in 1837, 1854 and 1867 had largely been left unimplemented. The Local Government Act 1888 had set up a County of London which surrounded, but did not include, the square mile and main business district of the City of London. London was therefore governed by the Corporation of London at its core and the London County Council for its metropolitan area.
When the first London County Council was elected, the Progressive Party, closely allied to the parliamentary Liberals, took control. The first chairman of the LCC, Lord Rosebery, was strongly in favour of the unification of the city and county. Campaigning for the second county council elections in 1892, he set out the position of the Progressives:
The present arrangement by which a comparatively small district in the centre of London is detached from London and held aloof cannot be maintained. The object of parliament and of reformers must be that the city should be united with London as soon as possible and with as little friction as possible. Of all London reforms I lay infinitely the most stress on this, because each can supply what the other lacks, because so many reforms are contingent on it, and because you cannot have a complete municipality without it.
The Progressives increased their majority at the elections, and in November 1892 the council passed five resolutions seeking legislation to give the authority increased powers. It was resolved among other things to seek: The unification of London, by the removal of the division of the jurisdiction between city and county, which now hampers every reform, but especially the great questions of the public services, such as water, gas, markets &c.
The Liberal Party gained control of parliament at the general election in July of that year, and in February 1893 the Government announced that a royal commission would be appointed to formulate a scheme for the unification of London. The President of the Local Government Board, H. H. Fowler, told the Commons that the commission was to have five members, of which one each were to represent the views of the city and the county council respectively. Accordingly, he wrote to both bodies in March suggesting the names of individuals who might be acceptable. The process was drawn out as the city was reluctant to cooperate.
Membership and terms of reference
The royal commission was appointed on 27 March 1893, the members being: Leonard Henry Courtney, (chairman) Liberal Unionist member of parliament for Bodmin, who had held a number of junior ministerial posts in the Second Gladstone Ministry. Sir Thomas Henry Farrer, Bt., London County Council alderman, former deputy chairman of the LCC and member of the Progressive grouping. He was elevated to the peerage as Baron Farrer later in 1893. Robert Durning Holt, Mayor of Liverpool. In August 1893 he became the city's first Lord Mayor Henry Homewood Crawford, Solicitor to the Corporation of the City of London Edward Orford Smith, Town Clerk of Birmingham. Smith had led the campaign to obtain city status for Birmingham in 1889.
The secretary to the commission was George Edward Yorke Gleadowe.
The terms of reference were: ..to consider the proper conditions under which the amalgamation of the City and County of London can be effected, and to make specific and practical proposals for that purpose. The commission's quorum was set at three members, and it was given full power to call witnesses and examine books, documents, registers and records. They were also permitted to visit and personally inspect any place in the United Kingdom that they deemed expedient.
Conflict with the City
From the beginning of the commission's sittings the city were reluctant to have any dealings with the body. The main objection was that the terms of reference suggested a fait accompli, with the commission being given the duty of devising a method of amalgamating City and county, not whether this should go ahead. A special committee of the Common Council was established and in November 1893 advised the corporation to cease giving evidence, as the proposed merger was: ...a thing that should not be done and that the creation of a monster municipality is a thing to be utterly avoided, and the annihilation of the City equally to be avoided.
The Attorney General, Sir Charles Russell, attacked the city's attitude. The only reasons he could see for resisting the merger were a misplaced pride in the office of Lord Mayor and a "too sacred regard" for the City funds. Following the receipt of a letter from the President of the Local Government Board the City agreed to resume tendering evidence in December on the understanding that the terms of reference could be modified.
However, in February 1894, the City of London Corporation suddenly announced that they were withdrawing from furnishing evidence to the commission. The city's representative on the commission, H. Homewood Crawford, resigned with immediate effect. The Common Council wrote an open letter to The Times explaining their actions: firstly the assurances given by the President of the Local Government Board regarding the terms of reference of the commission had not been honoured; and secondly the commission was refusing to hear their evidence regarding the position, powers and duties of the vestries and other local authorities outside the city.
The London County Council submission
In contrast to the city, the county council engaged enthusiastically with the commission and submitted detailed proposals for merging city and county. The main points were: The administrative County of London and the City of London should form a single municipal area, and be designated the "City of London". The new area would constitute a county for all purposes. The Corporation of the City and the London County Council would be replaced by a single body known as the "Mayor, and Commonalty and Citizens of London". The new corporation would inherit all the property, powers, rights, privileges and distinctions of both bodies, as well as their debts and liabilities. All electors qualified to elect county councillors would be citizens. The corporation would consist of 118 councillors and 19 aldermen, identical in composition to the county council, and would be elected in the same way. The Lord Mayor would be elected by the corporation in the same way as those of municipal boroughs. A Deputy Mayor would be elected annually, and would perform the same functions as the chairman of a county council. A "City Local Authority" would be formed for the area of the existing City, elected triennially by those qualified to elect county councillors. The authority would have the same functions as an incorporated vestry or district board established under the Metropolis Management Act 1855. The High Sheriff of London would be chosen by the new council. The Commissioners of Lieutenancy of the City of London would be abolished, and the Lord Mayor would be ex officio lord lieutenant and custos rotulorum of London. Freedom of the City of London by patrimony, apprenticeship, purchase or gift would be abolished. The new council would be empowered to award honorary freedom as a mark of distinction. The Honourable The Irish Society would be abolished and its charter repealed. Its property in Ireland would pass to the corporations of Derry and Coleraine, or to any elective county authority established in the future.
The commission's report The commission issued its report on 29 September 1894. The report began by summarising the attempts to reform London government since 1835 and then laid out the general principles on which the area should be governed in future. There was general agreement among the witnesses called by the commission that a two-tier structure was needed, consisting of a "central body" and a number of "local authorities". The commissioners identified four questions that needed to be answered in order to carry out the reorganisation: What should be the constitution and functions of the central body? How should the powers, duties and property of the existing corporation be dealt with? What should be the constitution and functions of the local authority for the city and other areas of the Metropolis? What should the relationship between the local authorities and the central body? The main part of the report was accordingly divided into four sections, with detailed proposals on each of these issues.
Constitution and functions of the central body The new central body, which was to be called the Corporation of London, or more formally the "mayor and commonalty and citizens of London", was to be the legal successor of both the existing city corporation and the London County Council. In effect the status of city was to be extended from the old City to the area of the entire county, which would be redesignated as the City of London. The new city was to be governed by a council.
Councillors The first matter addressed was the membership and method of election of the central body. There were two competing systems of election to be considered: annual elections by thirds as happened in boroughs reformed by the Municipal Corporations Act 1835 and later legislation; or triennial elections of the whole body of councillors in the same way as county councils established under the 1888 act. The commission recommended that elections be held triennially.
Aldermen Both borough and county councils contained a proportion of aldermen, co-opted by the councillors. In boroughs there was one alderman for every three councillors, in county councils the ratio was one to six. In place of co-option, two methods of electing aldermen were suggested to the commission. The first was that they should be nominated by the second tier of local bodies, while the second was that they be elected in the same manner as councillors, but for a six-year term. Neither suggestion found favour by the commission who recommended no change.
Size of council The existing London County Council consisted of 118 councillors and 19 aldermen. The commission suggested that the city, which was represented by four councillors should have its representation increased to eight elected members. This was to reflect the fact that the in spite of its small population and area, the city's rateable value was one eighth of that of the whole of London. The resulting council would have 122 councillors, with a proportionate increase in the number of aldermen from 19 to 20.
Office of Lord Mayor The post of Lord Mayor of London would be retained, and would not be restricted to the City alderman. Instead the council would have the power to elect any citizen of London as lord mayor, who would be titular chairman of the council. All ceremonies surrounding the mayoralty, and all rights and privileges were to be continued. The lord mayor was to be a justice of the peace, and also hold the offices of lord lieutenant and custos rotulorum of London.
Town Clerk