Borough of Copeland


The Borough of Copeland is a local government district and borough in western Cumbria, England. Its council is based in Whitehaven. It was formed on 1 April 1974 by the merger of the Borough of Whitehaven, Ennerdale Rural District and Millom Rural District. The population of the Non-Metropolitan district at the 2011 Census was 70,603.
The name is derived from an alternative name for the Cumberland ward of Allerdale above Derwent, which covered roughly the same area.
There are different explanations for the name. According to a document issued at the time of the borough's grant of arms, the name is derived from kaupland, meaning "bought land," referring to an area of the Forest bought from the estate of St Bees Priory. However, Angus Winchester holds that the name derives from the time of the Irish-Norse invasion of the area in the tenth century. According to this explanation, the area was purchased from the Kingdom of Strathclyde, possibly with loot from Ireland. Geoffrey Hodgson argues that this Viking invasion accounts for the high frequency of the surname Hodgson in the area.

Demographics

In 2014 the borough of Copeland was found to have the fattest population in England with a percentage of 75.9% being either overweight or obese according to official PHE statistics.
In 2018 Copeland had the third highest median income of UK local authorities, after the City of London and Tower Hamlets. However this median hides the wide differences in income between those who work at the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing site and elsewhere in the borough, leading to Copeland being described as ‘a community of two halves’.

Governance

Elections to the borough council are held every four years, with currently 51 councillors being elected at each election. Since the first election in 1973 the council has been under Labour control, apart from between 1976 and 1979 when it was under no overall control. As of the 2015 election the council is composed of the following councillors:

Directly-elected mayor

On 22 May 2014 a referendum was carried out in the borough to change the style of governance in Copeland to a directly-elected mayor, after campaigners from the Time For Change team successfully obtained enough signatures from 5% of the electorate in a petition. The referendum result was: For: 12,671; Against: 5,489.
The first election for mayor was held on 7 May 2015 and Mike Starkie was elected by 15,232 votes to the Labour Party candidate Steve Gibbon's 14,259 votes.