Councillors (or in London, Greater London Assembly members) are in a majority of one on all police authorities. Every upper tier council (i.e. a county council, or district where there is no county council, or in the case of London, the Greater London Authority) can nominate members to sit on police authorities.
It is up to councils to decide which councillors to appoint to the police authority, but they must do so within certain rules. The most important of these is political balance, which means that the political balance of the councillors appointed to the police authority must reflect the political balance of the councils in the area of the police authority.
In a few cases, such as Cumbria, this will be relatively easy, as the councillors appointed to the police authority will need to reflect the balance of only one council – the county council. In other areas it is a more complex calculation, which needs to take into account the balance on a number of different councils. Where this is the case, appointments are made by a joint committee of all councils within the area, so that these factors can be taken into account.
Elected mayors for upper tier councils can automatically be appointed members of police authorities if they and their councils wish, and the political balance calculation for other councillor members will then need to take the political party of the mayor into account.
Police authorities can ask their local councils to appoint members able to provide certain competencies, skills, diversity or time commitments to the authority, and councils will need to comply with this as far as possible.
Relevant legislation