Southampton City Council is the local authority of the city of Southampton. It is a unitary authority, having the powers of a non-metropolitan county and district council combined. It provides a full range of local government services including council tax billing, libraries, social services, processing planning applications, waste collection and disposal, and it is a local education authority. The council uses a leader and cabinet structure. Labour has been in control of the council since 2022. History Southampton City Council has records in its archives of council meetings as early as 1199. The Local Government Act 1888 established Southampton as a county borough of the county Hampshire, then officially known as the County of Southampton. This meant that the city of Southampton had independent governance from the county. Local government restructuring with an act in 1973 made the City of Southampton a non-metropolitan district within the Hampshire county. It succeeded Hampshire County Council and became a Unitary Authority in April 1997 due to the 1992 Local Government Act. From 2000 to 2008 the council was under no overall control of any one party. Though the Liberal Democrats supported a minority Conservative administration after the 2007 election, in February 2008 the Lib Dems aligned with the Labour party to set a new budget. The subsequent May 2008 election that year saw the Conservatives achieved a majority control of the council. Since the 2012 council election the Labour party re-took control of the city council, Mark Williams was council leader for a few months and resigned for behaviours that, according to an independent enquiry, "fell below national guidelines of openness and honesty in public life" after attempting to cover up the split of Coxford councillors Don Thomas and Keith Morrell from the Labour party. He was replaced as council leader by Simon Letts in 2013. There have been two splits from the party whilst in a majority administration due to the implementation of austerity measures from central government: the two aforementioned Coxford councillors in 2013 who originally called themselves the 'Labour Councillors Against the Cuts' group, and later known as 'Putting People First'; and Redbridge councillor Andrew Pope in 2015, who formed the Southampton Independents. In the 2018 election both Simon Letts, and Jeremy Moulton, the leader of the Conservative group, lost their seats. Chris Hammond became the new leader of the council after the election. In 2018 two municipal companies were