There has been a Hackney local authority since 1856 when the
Hackney District was created covering the two
ancient parishes of
Hackney and
Stoke Newington, governed by an elected board. It was one of the
lower tier authorities within the area of the
Metropolitan Board of Works, which was established to provide services across the
metropolis of London. In 1889 the Metropolitan Board of Works' area was made the
County of London. The Hackney District was dissolved in 1894 and the
vestries of each parish took on the functions previously exercised by the district board. In 1900 the lower tier of local government across London was reorganised into
metropolitan boroughs, each with a borough council, including
Hackney,
Shoreditch and
Stoke Newington. The London Borough of Hackney and its council were created under the
London Government Act 1963, with the first election held
in 1964. For its first year the council acted as a shadow authority alongside the area's outgoing authorities, being the councils of the three metropolitan boroughs of Hackney, Shoreditch and Stoke Newington. The new council formally came into its powers on 1 April 1965, at which point the old boroughs and their councils were abolished. The council's full legal name is "The Mayor and Burgesses of the London Borough of Hackney". From 1965 until 1986 the council was a lower-tier authority, with upper-tier functions provided by the
Greater London Council. The split of powers and functions meant that the Greater London Council was responsible for "wide area" services such as fire, ambulance,
flood prevention, and
refuse disposal; with the boroughs (including Hackney) responsible for "personal" services such as social care, libraries, cemeteries and
refuse collection. The Greater London Council was abolished in 1986 and its functions passed to the London Boroughs, with some services provided through joint committees. Hackney became a
local education authority in 1990 when the
Inner London Education Authority was dissolved. In the 1980s and early 1990s the left-wing Labour council clashed with the Conservative government on numerous occasions, notably during the
rate-capping rebellion in 1985 and over the
poll tax in 1990, with Hackney being one of the centres of the
poll tax riots. An independent inquiry in 1998 was highly critical of the council's investigations into one of its social workers, employed between 1981 and 1993, against whom a number of complaints of child sexual abuse had been made. He had been allowed to continue working. His position as a Labour activist and trade union official was said to have hindered the investigations. The social worker himself was never convicted, having died of an
AIDS-related illness in 1995, but the police subsequently reported that they had been about to arrest him at the time of his death. The local Labour party split when the allegations were made public, which was a contributory factor to the council going under
no overall control for a number of years in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Since 2000 the
Greater London Authority has taken some responsibility for highways and planning control from the council, but within the
English local government system the council remains a "most purpose" authority in terms of the available range of powers and functions. Former mayor Philip Glanville stood down after being suspended by the Labour Party when a photo emerged of him at a social event with an ex-councillor convicted of possessing images of penetrative and sadistic sexual abuse of young children. Tom Dewey, the councillor involved was elected in 2022 and resigned after six days, due to his arrest. Caroline Woodley was subsequently elected as Mayor in 2023. ==Powers and functions==