Borough of Darlington
Darlington is a unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of County Durham, north-east England. It borders the non-metropolitan county of County Durham to the north and west, Stockton-on-Tees to the east and North Yorkshire to the south along the line of the River Tees. The urban centre and the base of the borough is the town of Darlington. In 2011 it had a resident population of 106,000. The borough is a member of the Tees Valley combined authority area.
Council
The current borough boundaries were formed on 1 April 1974, by the creation of a new non-metropolitan district of Darlington by the Local Government Act 1972, covering the previous county borough of Darlington along with nearly all of Darlington Rural District. It remained part of County Durham for administrative purposes until reconstituted as a unitary authority on 1 April 1997. For ceremonial purposes it remains part of County Durham, with whom it continues to share certain local services, such as Fire and Rescue and Police. It is included within the Tees Valley area for both cultural and regional government administration.It is made up of 20 council wards, sixteen within the town of Darlington itself, which are also covered by the Darlington parliamentary constituency and four rural wards of Heighington & Coniscliffe, Hurworth, Middleton St George and Sadberge & Whessoe, of which the borough council shares joint ownership with the other four Tees Valley councils and Peel Holdings.
The council operates a Leader and Cabinet model of political leadership although a group of local residents aimed to force a referendum on moving to a system with directly-elected executive Mayor. Their bid was unsuccessful.
The political composition of the council, as of a May 2019 local elections, is Conservative 22;Labour 20; Liberal Democrats 3; Independent 3 and Green Party 2. Since then, one Labour councillor has declared he is now an Independent.
Economy
This is a chart of trend of regional gross value added of Darlington at current basic prices by Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling.| Year | Regional Gross Value Added | Agriculture | Industry | Services |
| 1995 | 1,115 | 8 | 377 | 729 |
| 2000 | 1,192 | 6 | 417 | 768 |
| 2003 | 1,538 | 6 | 561 | 971 |
includes hunting and forestry
includes energy and construction
includes financial intermediation services indirectly measured
Components may not sum to totals due to rounding