Local Government (Scotland) Act 1929

25 Division of counties into districts and establishment of district councils.

(1) For the purposes of the provisions of this Act relating to district councils, the reconstituted county council of every county shall, on or before the first day of February, nineteen hundred and thirty, prepare and submit to the Secretary of State for his approval a scheme (in this section called a " district council scheme") dividing the landward part of the county into districts in such manner that each district shall comprise one or more electoral divisions, and the provisions of subsections (1), (8), (9) and (10) of section fourteen of this Act shall with the necessary modifications apply to schemes under this subsection and any new scheme altering the boundaries of a district may make provision for financial adjustments, and for doing anything which may be required or be expedient for the proper carrying into effect of the new scheme.

(2) There shall be established for every district a district council which shall consist of the number of members specified in the district council scheme. The members of the county council for the electoral divisions within the district shall be ex-officio members of the district council, and the other members of the district council shall be elected for the electoral divisions within the district or for wards forming part thereof as may be provided in the scheme.

(3) The first election of members of the district council shall take place on the eighth day of April, nineteen hundred and thirty, and the members so elected shall hold office until the next election of members, which shall take place on the first Tuesday of December, nineteen hundred and thirty-two.

(4) For the purposes of the first election of members of district councils, the statutory provisions regulating the election of county councillors in landward parts of counties shall apply, subject to such modifications and adaptations as the Secretary of State may by order prescribe, and for the purposes of the second and subsequent elections of members of district councils the statutory provisions regulating the election of parish councillors in landward parishes and the landward parts of parishes (including the provisions of section eighteen of the Act of 1894) shall apply, subject to such modifications and adaptations as the Secretary of State may by order prescribe, and such orders shall provide that the expenses of elections of district councils shall be repaid to the county councils by the district councils.

(5) In the case of each of the counties of Kinross and Nairn, the provisions of this section shall not apply unless the council of the county so determine, and, if the county council do not so determine, references in this Act to a district council and to the district of a district council shall be respectively construed as references to the county council and to the county : Provided that, where the county council shall, after the commencement of this Act, determine that the provisions of this section shall apply, the scheme shall make the like provision as in the case of a new scheme altering the boundaries of a district.