A history of the mayoralty

A history of the mayoralty

One of my first assignments as a young reporter fifty years ago was to interview the retiring Mayor of Peterborough and when I asked how his year in office had gone, he replied: "It was like being king for a day". His reply has stuck with me ever since for it sums up the unreality of a situation in which you are suddenly thrust into the limelight by being given a job in which you are feted like royalty but one that has no official parameters other than to be seen.

A mayor was originally an overseer or bailiff and stems from the Norman maeur or mair although there is an alterative explanation that it comes from the Latin major meaning greater or superior. These derivations invite the assumption that the mayoralty we know today is an extremely ancient institution whereas it is a comparatively late development in local government organisation yet still has connotations of Ruritania and even Toytown, for those of us old enough to remember the popular BBC Children's Hour radio series of that name.

The position of mayor in England was largely governed by the Local Government Act of 1933 which required the council of every borough to make it their first duty at each annual meeting to elect a mayor who normally holds office for one year but may be re-elected. There have been changes since, consistent with the various re-organisations of local government, and so the title of mayor is now usually reserved for the head of an urban administration, one that has been granted district or borough status by royal charter. The system is different in the United States where the mayor is the elected head of a city or town and in 1999, the Labour government in Britain floated proposals for directly-elected mayors, a system that is now being adopted by some of the larger authorities, notably in London where the controversial Ken Livingstone was elected by public vote in May 2000. The latter system is also prevalent in Europe and ostensibly enables decisions to be made without the red tape of committee and council meetings and is therefore meant to be a faster and more efficient means of running local affairs.

It is unlikely that small towns such as Bourne will ever get a directly elected mayor and so the present system will remain with us for the foreseeable future. On Tuesday 6th May 2003, Councillor Trevor Holmes, aged 62, a retired sales representative, became the 32nd Mayor of Bourne and will continue in office for a year, with his wife Pam as mayoress, as is the custom.

The mayoralty in Bourne dates back only 30 years. From 1899, our affairs were in the hands of Bourne Urban District Council which had a chairman but under the local government re-organisation of 1974, all urban authorities in England were replaced by district councils and henceforward, Bourne's affairs came under the control of South Kesteven District Council based in Grantham. The town however, retained a parish council which, because of its historic status, was given special dispensation to become a town council with a chairman who is also the mayor, and this authority took over the Coat of Arms and civic regalia previously enshrined in Bourne UDC. Our first citizen, therefore, is no more than the chairman of the parish council but by recent tradition, is elected as mayor by his peers.

Apart from taking the chair at council meetings, the mayoral duties are ornamental rather than practical and extend to attending public functions as a representative of the town council, garden fetes, concerts, dinners, coffee mornings, and the like, and therefore involve a constant round of glad-handing and the risk of putting on pounds while navigating the rubber chicken circuit, culminating with the Civic Ball at the end of the term, when those who have been of help during the year are thanked personally for their support.

The office then, is one of adornment rather than achievement, as exemplified by the silver chain of office he wears during his tenure. It is filled by rotation on a basis of seniority rather than merit, a case of Buggins's turn, and as council seats are liable to change, it is possible to become mayor twice in a short space of time, as has happened to seven councillors in Bourne since 1974. There is also no requirement to be elected by the people, as with the present council which has 14 members, all of whom have been returned unopposed without a single vote being cast.

Some of those who do become mayor tend to get carried away with the euphoria of elevation and may be forgiven for promising the unattainable when donning the chain of office for the first time, however well-intentioned these aims and objectives may be. Our new mayor, for instance, has said that he wants to put Bourne on the map (Stamford Mercury, Friday 9th May) although it is a safe bet that the status of this town will not have changed one iota when he leaves office in twelve months' time. Other aims to which the mayor aspires, such as improving facilities for younger age groups, stopping kids from drifting into licensed premises and even the establishment of a soft drinks pub (The Local, Friday May 9th), are also unlikely to materialise. The mayor has no more powers to make them happen while in office than he did as a mere town councillor but it does sound good at the time and is therefore worthy of a round of applause and headlines in the local newspapers. Reality is a little different.

What then can we expect from our mayors in the future? The answer is very little, except a high profile and there is little wrong with that. The title is far more important than the job itself. But all organisations need a figurehead and in Bourne, that role is filled by the mayor. The office may be an anachronism but if Parliament can have its pomp and ceremony, then why cannot we have a little of the same. It achieves nothing but the chain of office does symbolise a dignity and a civic pride in our town and for that reason alone, it is worth keeping.

WRITTEN MAY 2003