Explanation of local government

In non-metropolitan areas, communities are either governed by:

• A lower tier district council (occasionally called a "district" or a "shire district").
• An upper tier county council (occasionally called a "shire county").

or,

• A single-tier unitary authority, which holds the powers of both a county council and a district council. Unitary authorities are legally considered lower-tier councils that can also perform the actions of a county council.

In Scotland and Wales, all local government is single-tier. Scotland is governed by 32 councils, commonly called "Scottish councils", and Wales is governed by 22 "principal councils", commonly known as Welsh unitaries.

In metropolitan areas, communities are governed by a metropolitan borough. For historical reasons this is legally considered a lower-tier authority, but de facto wields the power of a unitary authority. Despite this, there is no upper-tier council governing metropolitan districts. London boroughs are very similar to metropolitan boroughs, but legally different.

The UK government refers to the lowest tier of local government (i.e. district councils, metropolitan boroughs, London boroughs, unitary authorities, Scottish councils and Welsh authorities) as local authority districts. These are not to be confused with district councils. LADs are made up of wards, which elect one or more councillors. County councils are made up of electoral divisions, although some unitary authorities choose to refer to their wards as electoral divisions.

LADs can choose to pool their resourced to become a combined authority; similarly, upper-tier authorities can pool their resources to form a combined county authority. CA/CCAs are not directly elected, but made up of representatives from their constituent councils. They can, however, choose to have directly-elected mayors. Note that the Greater London Authority and its mayoralty are not part of a combined authority, but are legally distinct.

Devolved assemblies (the Senedd, Scottish Parliament, and London Assembly) are not related to this system of local government.

For a deeper explanation of how and why the system is the way it is, see the history page.

What does Octolamp show?

Octolamp currently provides three views:

1. County councils: it is possible to view the political makeup of all county councils in a given year, or of those elected in a given year.
2. Local authority districts: it is possible to view the political makeup of all LADs in a given year, or of those elected in a given year.
3. Wards: for the years 2021—2024 inclusive, elections to LADs can be further broken down and viewed by ward.

Octolamp does not currently support viewing the results of mayoral elections for combined authorities and combined county authorities.