Public Affairs

Winchester is conservative and Steve Brine is the current MP, he represents Winchester in parliament but has no direct control in the local council. The MP has a clinic on Friday’s where you can address him and make complaints, but he has very little direct power.

There are two tiers of council power:
County Council
City Council/District Council
Parish Council/Town Forum

The most notable difference between a county and city council is their difference in budget, Hampshire country council controls a budget of £1.8 billion, whereas the Winchester city council only controls a budget of £12 million.
Big cities such as Southampton only have a 1 layer “unitary authority”.
Local authorities are funded by a combination of grants from central government, council tax and business rates. Council tax only provides about a quarter of the local funding.
Councillors are elected by local people for a four year term from a ward (area, like an MP gets elected from a constituency, a councillor will be elected from a ward). Councillors are responsible for making decisions on behalf of their local community about local services, such as land use and parking restrictions.

As a journalist you can report on council meetings as you have Qualified Privilege, but you must give a councillor the right to defend themselves if you are going to publish something defamatory.