Darley Dale Town Council - Powers and Duties of Local Councils

A-Z of powers and duties of local councils

Function	Powers and Duties
Allotments	Powers to provide allotments. Duty to provide allotment gardens if demand satisfied
Baths and washhouses	Power to provide public baths and washhouses
Burial grounds, cemeteries and crematoria	Power to acquire and maintain. Power to Provide. Power to agree to maintain monuments and memorials. Power to contribute towards expenses of cemeteries.
Bus shelters	Power to provide and maintain shelters
Bye laws	Power to make byelaws in regard to pleasure grounds. Cycle parks, baths and washhouses, open space and burial grounds, mortuaries and post-mortem rooms.
Charities	Duty to receive accounts of parochial charities.
Clocks	Power to provide public clocks.
Closed churchyards	Powers as to maintenance.
Commons and common pastures	Powers in relation to enclosure, as to regulation and management, and as to providing common pasture.
Conference facilities	Power to provide and encourage the use of facilities.
Community centres	Power to provide and equip buildings for use of clubs having athletic, social or educational objectives.
Crime prevention	Powers to spend money on various crime prevention measures.
Drainage	Power to deal with ponds and ditches.
Education	Right to appoint school governors.
Entertainment and the arts	Provision of entertainment and support of the arts.
Gifts	Power to accept.
Highways	Power to repair and maintain public footpaths and bridleways. Power to light roads and public places. Provision of litterbins. Power to provide parking places for vehicles, bicycles and motorcycles. Power to enter into agreement as to dedication and widening. Power to provide roadside seats and shelters and bus shelters. Consent of parish council required for ending maintenance of highway at public expense, or for stopping up or diversion of highway. Power to complain to district council as to protection of rights of way and roadside wastes. Power to provide traffic signs and other notices. Power to plant trees etc. and to maintain roadside verges.
Investments	Power to participate in schemes of collective investment.
Land	Power to acquire by agreement, to appropriate, to dispose of. Power to accept gifts of land.
Litter	Provision of receptacles.
Lotteries	Powers to promote.
Mortuaries and post-mortem rooms	Power to provide mortuaries and post-mortem rooms.
Nuisances	Power to deal with offensive ditches
Open spaces	Power to acquire land and maintain.
Parish property and documents	Powers to direct as to their custody.
Postal and telecommunications facilities	Power to pay the Post Office, British Telecommunications or any other public telecommunications operator for any loss sustained in providing post or telegraph office or telecommunications facilities.
Public buildings and village halls	Power to provide buildings for offices and for public meetings and assemblies.
Public conveniences	Power to provide.
Recreation	Power to acquire land for or to provide recreation grounds, public walks, pleasure grounds and open spaces and to manage and control them. Power to provide gymnasiums, playing fields, and holiday camps. Provision of boating pools.
Town and County Planning	Right to be notified of planning applications.
Tourism	Power to contribute to organisations encouraging tourism.
Traffic calming	Powers to contribute financially to traffic calming schemes.
Transport	Powers to spend money on community transport schemes.
War memorials	Power to maintain, repair, protect and adapt war memorials.
Water supply	Power to utilise well, spring or stream and to provide facilities for obtaining water therefrom.

This list is intended only as a summary of the principal functions of local councils. It is not intended to be a definitive list of such functions. It is based on the DoE Consultation Paper, 'The Role of Parish and Town Councils in England'. August 1992.