Birkenhead

| related_legislation = | status = repealed | legislation_history = | theyworkforyou = | millbankhansard = | original_text = https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/Vict/6-7/13/pdfs/ukla_18430013_en.pdf | revised_text = | use_new_UK-LEG = | UK-LEG_title = | collapsed = yes }} Birkenhead was historically a chapelry in the ancient parish of Bidston, which formed part of the Wirral Hundred of Cheshire. For some purposes it was deemed an extra-parochial township. As the town began to develop rapidly in the early nineteenth century, there was a need for more urban forms of local government. The (3 & 4 Will. 4. c. lxviii) set up a body of improvement commissioners covering the chapelry of Birkenhead. The commissioners' district was enlarged by the (6 & 7 Vict. c. xiii) to take in the township of Claughton with Grange and part of Oxton. Local government districts were subsequently established for Tranmere in 1860 and Oxton in 1863.

In 1877 Birkenhead was incorporated as a municipal borough, with its territory covering the combined area of the old commissioners' district and the two local government districts of Oxton and Tranmere, which were abolished. The new borough also took in the Rock Ferry area from Bebington. When elected county councils were established in 1889, Birkenhead was considered large enough to provide its own county-level services, and so it was made a county borough, making it independent from the new Cheshire County Council, whilst still being deemed part of Cheshire for ceremonial purposes.

The council built itself Birkenhead Town Hall on Hamilton Square to serve as its headquarters; the building was opened in 1887. The borough was enlarged in 1928 to absorb Landican, Prenton and Thingwall, and again in 1933 to take in Bidston, Noctorum, Upton and Woodchurch.

The borough of Birkenhead was abolished in 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972, with the area becoming part of the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral and being transferred to the metropolitan county of Merseyside. In 1986 Merseyside County Council was abolished, with Wirral Council then taking on the county council's former functions in the area. Since 2014 Wirral and the other Merseyside boroughs and neighbouring Halton have been covered by the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, which has been led by a directly elected mayor since 2017. Provided by Wikipedia