More about Wakefield

Wakefield is a city and metropolitan district in West Yorkshire, England. In addition to the city of Wakefield, the district covers a wide area including seven other towns. The "Five Towns" commonly grouped together are Normanton, Pontefract, Featherstone, Castleford and Knottingley. The other two towns are Ossett, to the west of Wakefield, and Hemsworth, to the south-east. There are also several large villages: Crigglestone, Ackworth, Horbury, South Kirkby, Upton and South Elmsall. It is lies between Leeds and Sheffield.

As recently as 2001, the Labour Party held more seats here than anywhere else in the country, but there has been a large swing against Labour in recent years; it only won 13 out of 21 seats in 2006. The district is mainly made out of old coal-mining towns, although other industries include wool, chemicals, machine tools, glass [Castleford] and other forms of manufacturing. When Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979, there were 21 pits in the district. When the strike began in 1984, there were 15. No other district in the country had anything like as many collieries. At the time of privatisation in November 1994, only two remained: "Prince of Wales" at Pontefract closed in 2002 and "Kellingley" at Knottingley is now the sole remainder of the industry that dominated the district. Most of the district's pits had been very hardline during the strike.

In recent years, the economic and physical condition of several of the former mining towns and villages in Wakefield District have started to improve due to the booming economy of Leeds - and an increase in numbers of commuters to the city from the sub-region - and a recognition of undeveloped assets. For instance Castleford, to the North East of Wakefield is seeing extensive development and investment because of the natural asset of its outlook on to the River Aire, its easy access to the national motorway network and the availability of former mining land for house-building. In Ossett, house prices have risen from an average of £50,000 in 1998 to £130,000 in 2003.

Whilst unemployment was amongst the highest in the country for most of the 1980s and 1990s, Wakefield District now has below-average unemployment. The "Wakefield East" ward had 4.7% unemployment in May 2005 (source: Office for National Statistics) - which was more than 1% higher than any other ward. The eastern half of the district remains considerably less prosperous than the western half, with several deprived wards. Other problems typical of such an area include rates of suicide that are consistently amongst the highest in the country and a heroin problem that saw addiction rise by an incredible 3361% between 2000 and 2004.

A decision was made, in 2004, to sell the district's extensive council housing to Wakefield District Housing, an 'independent' housing association, who would be more efficient with repairs and maintaining decent accommodation; as council housing represented almost 30% of the district, this was the second-largest stock transfer in British history. The new owners have indicated that they plan to demolish most of their new stock in Fitzwilliam and some in Hemsworth, which has become very run-down.

The City of Wakefield MDC's Queen Anne style administrative HQ, County Hall (1898), WakefieldThe present boundaries were set in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972, when the county borough of Wakefield merged with the West Riding municipal boroughs of Castleford, Ossett and Pontefract, the urban districts of Featherstone, Hemsworth, Horbury, Knottingley, Normanton and Stanley, along with Wakefield Rural District and parts of Hemsworth Rural District and Osgoldcross Rural District.

Source: Wikipedia