Welcome to Urswick Parish Council
Parish councils are the lowest tier of government in England. They are no longer anything to do with the church, although they were in times past. The parish council is responsible for a parish or a number of parishes. Urswick Parish Council covers the areas of Great & Little Urswick, Bardsea and Stainton with Adgardley. Parishioners are represented by a total of eight Councillors, two representing the Bardsea, one representing Stainton with Adgarley and five representing Urswick.
The next tier above parish councils is the district council, which covers a much wider area, and above that comes the county council. Town councils sometimes exist as an alternative to parish councils Ulverston Town Council being an example. The parish is within the local government jurisdiction of South Lakeland District Council based at Kendal and Cumbria County Council based at Carlisle. The Parish is served by three District Councillors and one County Councillor. The parish ward of Urswick has two District Councillors who represent the district ward of Mid Furness; whilst the other two parish wards of Bardsea and Stainton with Adgarley share a District Councillor with the whole of neighbouring Aldingham Parish, the collective making up the District ward of Low Furness. The County Councillor also covers the Low Furness Ward.
The parish can get money from its residents in the form of a "precept", which is added to the figures requested by the county council, the police and fire authority and the district council and is then collected by the district council in the council tax.
The Council meets once every six weeks on Thursday evenings with the venue rotating between Urswick Sunday School, Bardsea Schoolroom and Stainton Recreation Hall. Meetings normally commence at 7:30 pm, but exceptions do occur, typically when a speaker has been invited to address the Council on a particular topic. The agenda, which is accessible from this page, should be checked for the dates and times of the meetings.
The Parish Council is committed to providing representation of its parishioners to obtaining improved levels of service from both South Lakeland District Council & Cumbria County Council. The maintenance of the physical environment of the parish is of great importance and as such the Parish Council is directly responsible for providing the following services to the villages:
- commenting on all planning applications
- small road maintenance issues
- grass cutting
- Liaising with the police on issues such as dog fouling, speeding etc.
- bus shelters
- many small bits of land around the villages (mainly green spaces)
- the war memorial
The parish has published edition 1 of its Parish Plan and work is ongoing to implement the action items which it contains. Work in producing the Parish Plan has been followed by the development of a Village Design Statement for which work is ongoing. The desire exists to be accredited as a Quality Parish within the terms of the Government's Quality Parish and Town Council scheme and the council continues to work to put in place all criteria that are within its control and required in order to secure Quality Parish status. This website bears testimony to the council's commitment to improving communications with its parishioners and encouraging their engagement in matters affecting this ancient parish.
Any comments as to how the website could be improved are most welcome.