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In England, a '''civil parish''' is a type of [[Parish (administrative division)|administrative parish]] used for [[Local government in England|local government]]. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the [[Parish (Church of England)|ancient system of parishes]], which for centuries were the principal unit of secular and religious administration in most of England and Wales. Civil and religious parishes were formally split into two types in the 19th century and are now entirely separate. Civil parishes in their modern form came into being through the [[Local Government Act 1894]] ([[56 & 57 Vict.]] c. 73), which established elected [[Parish councils in England|parish councils]] to take on the secular functions of the [[vestry|parish vestry]].
A civil parish can range in size from a sparsely populated rural area with fewer than a hundred inhabitants, to a large [[town]] with a population [[List of the most populous civil parishes in England|in excess of 100,000]]. This scope is similar to that of municipalities in continental Europe, such as the [[communes of France]]. However, unlike their continental European counterparts, parish councils are not [[Principal council|principal authorities]], and in most cases have a relatively minor role in local government.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.bristol.ac.uk/media-library/sites/sps/migrated/documents/neilbarnett.pdf |title=Is UK local government really so big? |last1=Barnett |first1=Neil |last2=Sweeting |first2=David |website=University of Bristol |date=2013 |access-date=20 July 2022}}</ref>
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Eight parishes also have [[City status in the United Kingdom|city status]] (a status granted by the [[Monarchy of the United Kingdom|monarch]]). A civil parish may be equally known as and confirmed as a town, village, [[neighbourhood]] or [[community]] by resolution of its parish council, a right not conferred on other units of English local government. The governing body of a civil parish is usually an elected parish council (which can decide to call itself a town, village, community or neighbourhood council, or a city council if the parish has city status). Alternatively, in parishes with small populations (typically fewer than 150 electors) governance may be by a [[parish meeting]] which all electors may attend; alternatively, parishes with small populations may be grouped with one or more neighbours under a common parish council.
[[Wales]] was also divided into civil parishes until 1974, when they were replaced by [[Community (Wales)|communities]], which are similar to English parishes in the way they operate. [[Civil parishes in Scotland]] were abolished for local government purposes by the [[Local Government (Scotland) Act 1929]]; the Scottish equivalent of English civil parishes are the [[Community council#Scotland|community council areas]] established by the [[Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973]], which have fewer powers than their English and Welsh counterparts. There are no equivalent units in [[Northern Ireland]].
==History==
===Ancient parishes===<!-- Ancient parish redirects here -->
The parish system in Europe was established between the 8th and 12th centuries,<ref>Encyclopaedia Britannica 1993{{full citation needed|date=November 2023}}</ref> and an early form was long established in England by the time of the [[Norman Conquest of England|Norman Conquest]]. These areas were originally based on the territory of [[Manorialism |manors]],<ref name="Baker 1989">{{cite book | title=Local Council Administration in English Parishes and Welsh Communities | year=1989 | last=Arnold-Baker |first=Charles | author-link=Charles Arnold-Baker | publisher=Longcross Press |isbn=978-0-902378-09-4 }}</ref> which, in some cases, derived their bounds from Roman or Iron Age estates; some large manors were sub-divided into several parishes.<ref>{{cite book|title =The Local Historian's Encyclopaedia|first= John|last= Richardson|date = 1986|publisher = Historical Publications Limited}}</ref>
Initially, churches and their priests were the gift and continued patronage (benefaction) of the [[lord of the manor]], but not all were willing and able to provide, so residents would be expected to attend the church of the nearest manor with a church. Later, the churches and priests became to a greater extent the responsibility of the [[Catholic Church]] thus this was formalised; the grouping of manors into one parish was recorded, as was a manor-parish existing in its own right.<ref>Churches in the Landscape, Richard Morris, JM Dent & Sons, 1989, Chapter 6</ref>
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The consistency of these boundaries until the 19th century is useful to historians, and is also of cultural significance in terms of shaping local identities; reinforced by the use of grouped parish boundaries, often, by successive local authority areas; and in a very rough, operations-geared way by most postcode districts. There was (and is) wide disparity in parish size. [[Writtle]], Essex traditionally measures {{convert|13,568|acre|mi2|0}} – two parishes neighbouring are [[Shellow Bowells]] at {{convert|469|acre|mi2|1}}, and [[Chignall Smealy]] at {{convert|476|acre|mi2|1}}
Until the [[English reformation|break with Rome]],<ref>{{cite web |
The parish authorities were known as vestries and consisted of all the ratepayers of the parish. As the number of ratepayers of some parishes grew, it became increasingly difficult to convene meetings as an open vestry. In some, mostly built-up, areas the [[Vestry#Select vestry|select vestry]] took over responsibility from the entire body of ratepayers. This innovation improved efficiency, but allowed governance by a self-perpetuating elite.<ref name="Baker 1989" /> The administration of the parish system relied on the monopoly of the established English Church, which for a few years after [[Henry VIII of England|Henry VIII]] alternated between the Roman Catholic Church and the [[Church of England]], before settling on the latter on the accession of [[Elizabeth I of England|Elizabeth I]] in 1558. By the 18th century, religious membership was becoming more fractured in some places, due in part to the progress of [[Methodism]]. The legitimacy of the parish vestry came into question, and the perceived inefficiency and corruption inherent in the system became a source for concern in some places.<ref name="Baker 1989" /> For this reason, during the early 19th century the parish progressively lost its powers to ''ad hoc'' boards and other organisations, such as the [[Board of guardians|boards of guardians]] given responsibility for poor relief through the [[Poor Law Amendment Act 1834]]. [[Sanitary district]]s covered England in 1875 and Ireland three years later. The replacement boards were each entitled to levy their own rate in the parish; the church rate ceased to be levied in many parishes and became voluntary from 1868.<ref name="Baker 1989" />
===Civil and ecclesiastical split===
The ancient parishes diverged into two distinct, nearly exactly overlapping, systems of parishes during the 19th century. The [[Poor Law Amendment Act 1866]], which received [[royal assent]] on 10 August 1866, declared all areas that levied a separate rate or had their own [[overseer of the poor]] to be parishes. This included the Church of England parishes (until then simply known as "parishes"), [[extra-parochial area]]s, [[township (England)|township]]s and [[Chapelry|chapelries]]. To have collected rates this means these beforehand had their own vestries, boards or equivalent bodies. Parishes using this definition subsequently became known as "civil parishes" to distinguish them from the ecclesiastical parishes.<ref>{{cite book |title=A collection of the public general statutes passed in the twenty-ninth and thirtieth years of the reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria |date=1866 |location=London |pages=574–577 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SVYMAQAAMAAJ&dq=Poor+Law+Amendment+Act+1866&pg=PA574 |publisher=Google Books |access-date=6 November 2021 |chapter=Poor Law Amendment Act 1866 (29 & 30 Victoria, c. 113)}}</ref>
The Church of England parishes, which cover more than 99% of England, have become officially (and to avoid ambiguity) termed ''ecclesiastical parishes''. The limits of many of these have diverged; most greatly through changes in population and church attendance (these factors can cause churches to be opened or closed). Since 1921, each has been the responsibility of its own [[parochial church council]].
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In the late 19th century, most of the "ancient" (a legal term equivalent to [[time immemorial]]) irregularities inherited by the civil parish system were cleaned up, and the majority of [[exclave]]s were abolished. The [[1911 United Kingdom census|census of 1911]] noted that 8,322 (58%) of "parishes" in [[England and Wales]] were not geographically identical when comparing the ''civil'' to the ''ecclesiastical'' form.
===1894
In 1894, civil parishes were reformed by the [[Local Government Act 1894]] ([[56 & 57 Vict.]] c. 73) to become the smallest geographical area for local government in rural areas. The act abolished the civil (non-ecclesiastical) duties of [[vestry|vestries]]. Parishes which straddled county boundaries or [[sanitary district]]s had to be split so that the part in each urban or rural sanitary district became a separate parish (see [[List of county exclaves in England and Wales 1844–1974]]). The sanitary districts were then reconstituted as [[Urban district (England and Wales)|urban district]]s and [[rural district]]s, with parishes that fell within urban districts classed as urban parishes, and parishes that fell within rural districts were classed as rural parishes.
====Rural parishes====
The 1894
====Urban parishes====
Urban civil parishes were not given their own parish councils, but were directly administered by the council of the urban district or borough in which they were contained. Many urban parishes were coterminous (geographically identical) with the [[Urban district (England and Wales)|urban district]] or [[municipal borough]] in which they lay. Towns which included multiple urban parishes often consolidated the urban parishes into one. The urban parishes continued to be used as an electoral area for electing guardians to the [[poor law union]]s. The unions took in areas in multiple parishes and had a set number of guardians for each parish, hence a final purpose of urban civil parishes. With the abolition of the Poor Law system in 1930, urban parishes became a geographical division only with no administrative power; that was exercised at the urban district or borough council level.
===1965{{ndash}}1974
In 1965 civil parishes in London were formally abolished when [[Greater London]] was created, as the legislative framework for Greater London did not make provision for any local government body below a [[London borough]]. (Since the new county was beforehand a mixture of [[metropolitan borough]]s, municipal boroughs and urban districts, no extant parish councils were abolished.)
In 1974, the [[Local Government Act 1972]] retained rural parishes, but abolished most urban parishes, as well as the urban districts and boroughs which had administered them. Provision was made for smaller urban districts and boroughs to become [[successor parish]]es, with a boundary coterminous with an existing urban district or borough or, if divided by a new district boundary, as much as was comprised in a single district. There were 300 such successor parishes established. In urban areas that were considered too large to be single parishes, the parishes were simply abolished, and they became [[unparished area]]s. The distinction between types of parish was no longer made; whether parishes continued by virtue of being retained rural parishes or were created as successor parishes, they were all simply termed parishes. The 1972
===Sub-divisions===
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===Councillors and elections===
Parish councils comprise volunteer [[councillor]]s who are [[election|elected]] to serve for four years. Decisions of the council are carried out by a paid officer, typically known as a parish clerk. Councils may employ additional people (including bodies corporate, provided where necessary, by tender) to carry out specific tasks dictated by the council. Some councils have chosen to pay their elected members an allowance, as permitted under part 5 of the Local Authorities (Members' Allowances) (England) Regulations 2003.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.statutelaw.gov.uk/content.aspx?LegType=All+Primary&PageNumber=1&NavFrom=2&parentActiveTextDocId=0&linkToSearchEnacted=0&linkToSearchDay=3&linkToLocale=E%2BW%2BS%2BN.I.&linkToMatchExactLocale=0&linkToSearchMonth=12&linkToSearchYear=2008&linkToATDocumentId=840810&filesize=133430|title=Local Government Act 2000 The Local Authorities (Members' Allowances) (England) Regulations 2003 Reg 30}}{{Dead link|date=December 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>
The number of councillors varies roughly in proportion to the population of the parish.{{citation needed|date=November 2015}} Most rural parish councillors are elected to represent the entire parish, though in parishes with larger populations or those that cover larger areas, the parish can be divided into wards. Each of these wards then returns councillors to the parish council (the numbers depending on their population). Only if there are more candidates standing for election than there are seats on the council will an election be held. However, sometimes there are fewer candidates than seats. When this happens, the vacant seats have to be filled by [[co-option]] by the council. If a vacancy arises for a seat mid-term, an election is only held if a certain number (usually ten) of parish residents request an election. Otherwise the council will co-opt someone to be the replacement councillor.
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Large urban areas are mostly unparished, as the government at the time of the [[Local Government Act 1972]] discouraged their creation for large towns or their suburbs, but there is generally nothing to stop their establishment. For example, [[Birmingham]] has two parishes ([[New Frankley]] and [[Sutton Coldfield]]), [[Oxford]] has four, and the [[Milton Keynes urban area]] has 24. Parishes could not however be established in London until the law was changed in 2007.
A civil parish can range in area from a small village or town ward to a large tract of mostly uninhabited moorland in the Cheviots, Pennines or Dartmoor. The two largest as at December 2023<ref>{{Cite web |last=Statistics |first=Office for National |date=2024-01-04 |title=Parishes and Non Civil Parished Areas (December 2023) Boundaries EW BFE |url=https://www.data.gov.uk/dataset/9ab2f87b-5d21-4c39-bd35-edeff7017ca2/parishes-and-non-civil-parished-areas-december-2023-boundaries-ew-bfe |access-date=2024-01-29 |website=www.data.gov.uk |language=en}}</ref> are [[Stanhope, County Durham|Stanhope]] (County Durham) at {{Convert|98.6|sqmi|km2}}, and [[Dartmoor Forest]] (Devon) at {{Convert|79.07|sqmi|km2}}. The two smallest are parcels of shared rural land: [[Lands common to Axminster and Kilmington|Lands Common to Axminster and Kilmington]] (Devon) at {{Convert|0.012|sqmi|km2 ha acre}}, and Lands Common to [[Brancepeth]] and [[Brandon and Byshottles]] (County Durham) at {{Convert|0.0165|sqmi|km2 ha acre|abbr=out}}. The next two smallest are parishes in built up areas: [[Chester Castle (parish)|Chester Castle]] (Cheshire) at {{Convert|0.0168|sqmi|km2 ha acre}} (no recorded population) and [[Hamilton Lea]] (Leicestershire) at {{Convert|0.07|sqmi|km2 ha acre}} (1,021 residents at the 2021 census).
===Deserted parishes===
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=== General abolition of anomalies===
{{See also|Enclaves and exclaves|Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1844}}
Direct predecessors of civil parishes are most often known as "ancient parishes", although many date only from the mid 19th century. Using a longer historical lens the better terms are "pre-separation (civil and ecclesiastical) parish", "original medieval parishes" and "new parishes". The ''[[Victoria County History]]'', a landmark collaborative work mostly written in the 20th century (although incomplete), summarises the history of each English "parish", roughly meaning late medieval parish. A minority of these had [[enclave and exclave|exclaves]], which could be:
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Such anomalies mostly arose in the height of the [[feudal system]], when parishes evolved. Major land interests ([[Manorialism|manor]] proper or [[Catholic Church|church]] lands) may have acquired non-contiguous parcels of land i.e. beyond the original parish/county bounds or what would become the boundaries of a new parish. Those extraterritorial land parcels influenced the formation of parish boundaries where the parcels were significant to the parish. Thus secular land in an exclave, almost always manor, may have been the site of a prosperous farmstead, or remained part of the manor for generations, or the [[lord of the manor|lord/lady of the manor]] may have held the right to appoint the parish priest ([[advowson]]) or co-founded the church as its patron. The scenario may also have arisen originally as an attempt to [[Agricultural diversification|diversify]] the lord's (or overlord's) interests, or from a large burial ground in an urban setting. It could also arise from a chance inheritance. It caused inconvenience to the residents of most exclaves/enclaves (where not numerous or economically significant enough to have their own [[chapel of ease]] as to religious matters and a vestry as to civil matters). They had to attend a distant church and/or the [[manorial court]] for certain [[tithe]]s, rates, baptisms, marriages, funerals, or to obtain regular poor relief and most forms of education, charitable alms and hospitalry.
The end of [[manorial court]]s coincided with growing agricultural innovation, fragmentation of land ownership and housing growth. The church and vestries were reluctant to bring boundaries up to date. This meant such anomalies were irrelevant [[mischief rule|nuisance]]s with a real economic cost in distance of administration and confusion. They began to be remedied nationally in [[statute]] by Parliament in the early 19th century in the [[Poor Law Amendment Act 1834|Poor Law Reform]]s of 1834, and was more widely in 1844 when the [[Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1844
Other acts, including the [[Divided Parishes and Poor Law Amendment Act 1882]] eliminated instances of civil parishes being split between counties, so that by 1901 [[Stanground, Peterborough|Stanground]] in [[Huntingdonshire]] and the [[Isle of Ely]] was the last example;<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/text/chap_page.jsp?t_id=SRC_P&c_id=3&cpub_id=EW1901GEN|title=
The [[Church of England]] has only abolished these where locally incepted (under the Anglican and the Catholic principle of [[subsidiarity]]). This means it has essentially kept, often divided in urban areas, the original parishes. The Church's main website
<gallery>
File:Cowley_Civil_Parish_Map_1868.svg|Eight exclaves of highly anomalous [[Cowley, London|Cowley]], all in Hillingdon, then in Middlesex.
File:East_Barnet_Valley_Civil_Parish_Map_1863.svg|The two tiny exclaves of [[Municipal Borough of Enfield|Enfield]].
File:Westminster_Civil_Parish_Map_1870.png|Burial exclave of the 1724-created [[St George Hanover Square]] in Paddington. It remains only in the [[Church of England|C of E]]. Used for burials 1763–1852.<ref>It was sold in 1967 to the Utopian Housing Society who built 7 blocks, housing 300 flats and maisonettes, completed in 1973 having communal woodland gardens. Many of the site's mature trees, including a plane about 250 years old and a red oak, were retained; see http://londongardensonline.org.uk/gardens-online-record.php?ID=WST100 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180612142148/http://londongardensonline.org.uk/gardens-online-record.php?ID=WST100 |date=12 June 2018 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.achurchnearyou.com/church/15772/|title = St George's Hanover Square| date=17 December 2023 }}</ref>
File:Middlesex_parishes.jpg|Map of the other main enclaves and exclaves in Middlesex.
</gallery>
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