page_title: Kingston upon Hull
section_title: Governance
hierarchical_section_title: Kingston upon Hull / Governance
caption_attribution_description: Kingston upon Hull seen from the north bank of the Humber near Paull, East Riding of Yorkshire, England, with the hills of the Yorkshire Wolds rising behind the city.
context_page_description: Kingston upon Hull, usually abbreviated to Hull, is a port city and unitary authority in the East Riding of Yorkshire, northeastern England. It lies upon the River Hull at its confluence with the Humber Estuary, 25 miles inland from the North Sea, 50 miles east of Leeds, 34 miles south-east of York and 54 miles north-east of Sheffield. With a population of 259,778, Hull is the fourth-largest city in Yorkshire and the Humber.
  The town of Wyke on Hull was founded late in the 12th century by the monks of Meaux Abbey as a port from which to export their wool.
  Renamed Kings-town upon Hull in 1299, Hull had been a market town, military supply port, trading hub, fishing and whaling centre and industrial metropolis.
  Hull was an early theatre of battle in the English Civil Wars. Its 18th-century Member of Parliament, William Wilberforce, took a prominent part in the abolition of the slave trade in Britain.
  After suffering heavy damage in the Second World War, Hull weathered a period of post-industrial decline, gaining unfavourable results on measures of social deprivation, education and policing.
context_section_description: Following the Local Government Act 1888, Hull became a county borough, a local government district independent of the East Riding of Yorkshire. This district was dissolved under the Local Government Act 1972, on 1 April 1974 when it became a non-metropolitan district of the newly created shire county of Humberside. Humberside (and its county council) was abolished on 1 April 1996 and Hull was made a unitary authority area.
  The single-tier local authority of the city is now Hull City Council (officially Kingston upon Hull City Council), headquartered in the Guildhall in the city centre. The council was designated as the UK's worst performing authority in both 2004 and 2005, but in 2006 was rated as a two star 'improving adequate' council and in 2007 it retained its two stars with an 'improving well' status. In the 2008 corporate performance assessment the city retained its "improving well" status but was upgraded to a three star rating.
  The Liberal Democrats won overall control of the City Council in the 2007 local elections, ending several years in which no single party had a majority. They retained control in the 2008 local elections by an increased majority and in the 2010 local elections. Following the UK's local elections of 2011, the Labour Party gained control of the council, increasing their majority in the 2012 and retained this following the 2014 local elections. They increased their majority by one in the 2015 local elections, but lost it in the 
  2016 local elections. In the 2018 local elections all of the council was up for election following boundary changes that reduced the number of seats by 2. Labour retained control of the council but with a much reduced majority, while in the 2019 local elections there was no change to the make-up of the council.
  The city returned three members of parliament to the House of Commons and at the last general election, in 2019, elected three Labour MPs: Emma Hardy, Diana Johnson and Karl Turner.
  William Wilberforce is the most celebrated of Hull's former MPs. He was a native of the city and the member for Hull from 1780 to 1784 when he was elected as an Independent member for Yorkshire.
  Hull is the only city and forms the major urban area in the official government-defined Hull and Humber Ports City Region.
caption: Panorama of Hull from further along the north bank of the Humber near Paull, with the Yorkshire Wolds rising behind the city
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