The District of the Medway Towns (Parishes and Electoral Changes) Order 1997

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Order)

This Order gives effect to recommendations by the Local Government Commission for England for boundary and electoral changes in the district of the Medway Towns (constituted by the Kent (Borough of Gillingham and City of Rochester upon Medway) (Structural Change) Order 1996 and consisting of the areas of the districts of Gillingham and Rochester upon Medway).

Article 2 makes changes to the boundaries of the parishes of Cliffe, Frindsbury Extra, Stoke and St Mary Hoo, and renames the first the parish of Cliffe and Cliffe Woods.

Article 3 abolishes the existing wards of the district and provides for the creation of thirty-five new wards. That article and the Schedule also make provision for the names, areas and numbers of councillors for the new wards.

Prints of the map on which the boundary changes, and district warding arrangements, are shown may be inspected at all reasonable times at the offices of the Gillingham Borough Council and the Rochester upon Medway City Council (from 1st April 1998 at the offices of the Medway Towns District Council) and at the offices of the Secretary of State for the Environment which, until May 1997, are located at 2 Marsham Street, London SW1P 3EB and, thereafter, at 2nd Floor, Ashdown House, 123 Victoria Street, London SW1E 6DE.

Article 4 makes provision for whole council elections in the district of the Medway Towns in 1997, 2000 and 2003 and every fourth year after 2003.

Article 5 makes provision regarding elections of parish councils in the district of the Medway Towns.