Borough of Barrow-in-Furness

Barrow-in-Furness is a local government district with borough status in Cumbria, England. It is named after its main town, Barrow-in-Furness. Other settlements include Dalton-in-Furness, Roose and Askam-in-Furness. It is the smallest borough in the county, but is the most densely populated, with 924 people per square kilometre. The population was 71,980 in 2001 [1]

The area covered by the district is at the edge of the Furness peninsula. It jolts into the Irish Sea, being north of Morecambe Bay and south of the Duddon Estuary. This area is still part of the historic County Palatine of Lancashire but is no longer governed by Lancashire County Council.

The current borough was formed on April 1, 1974 by the merger of the former county borough of Barrow-in-Furness and the Dalton-in-Furness urban district from the administrative county of Lancashire.

Council

See also: Barrow-in-Furness local elections

Barrow-in-Furness Borough Council sits at the Town Hall in Barrow. It is lead by a mayor, who is elected by council members. In 2006, the Council was fined £125,000 for violation of health and safety laws that lead to the deaths of seven people in the United Kingdom's worst outbreak of Legionnaires' disease. The council also became the UK's first public body to be charged with corporate manslaughter, but was found not guilty.[2]

Following boundary changes in 2008, [3] the council is composed of 36 seats, elected across 13 wards. All seats will be re-elected in 2008; following this, the council has provisions to either continue with full council ections every four years, or to revert to the previous system of elections occuring over a four year cycle, with a third of seats elected each year and one 'fallow' year.

Since its inception in 1973, the council has had 22 years of Labour control (most recently from 2003-2006), 3 years of Conservative control (1976-1979) and 8 years of no overall control (current since 2006).

Current Composition
As of October 3 2007

Affiliation		Members
Template:British politics/party colours/Conservative|	Conservative Party	17
Template:British politics/party colours/Labour|	Labour Party	16
Template:British politics/party colours/Liberal Democrat|	Liberal Democrats	2 †
	Independent	2
	People's Party	1

† Councillors Gordon Murray and Lynn Murray switched from Conservative Party to Liberal Democrats in October 2007 [4]

Areas/ Wards of Barrow Borough Council

Barrow-in-Furness total population 71,980

Barrow Island Ward 2,606

Central Ward 5,585

Dalton North Ward 6,599

Dalton South Ward 6,200

Hawcoat Ward 5,308

Hindpool Ward 5,515

Newbarns Ward 5,913

Ormsgill Ward 5,961

Parkside Ward 5,742

Risedale Ward 5,663

Roosecote Ward 5,501

Walney North Ward 5,604

Walney South Ward 5,784

Demographics

Population, Area and Density

Region	Population	Area	Population Density
Barrow-in-Furness	71,980	77.87 km²	900 / km²
Cumbria	498,800	6,768 km²	73 / km²
United Kingdom	60,209,500	244,820 km²	243 / km²

Ethnic Diversity

Region	White British	White Other	Mixed Race	South Asian	Afro-Caribbean	Chinese	Other
Barrow-in-Furness	94.3%	2.9%	0.6%	1.0%	0.5%	0.2%	0.5%
Cumbria	96.7%	1.7%	0.5%	0.6%	0.2%	0.2%	0.1%
United Kingdom	85.7%	6.5%	1.2%	3.6%	2.3%	0.4%	0.8%

Religion

Religion	Barrow-in-Furness	United Kingdom
Christian	81.0%	71.6%
Muslim	0.3%	2.7%
Hindu	0.1%	1.0%
Jedi	N/A	0.7%
Sikh	0.0%	0.6%
Jewish	0.0%	0.5%
Buddhist	0.1%	0.3%
Other religion	0.1%	0.3%
Not stated	7.6%	7.3%
No religion	10.8%	15.5%
Total religious	81.6%	76.8%

Place of Birth

Region	Born in the UK	Born in the EU	Born Elswhere in the World
Barrow-in-Furness	97.7%	0.8%	1.5%
United Kingdom	91.7%	2.2%	6.1%