THE Queen will be asked to rule on Hereford's centuries old city status and solve a constitutional conundrum, writes BILL TANNER.
Royal assent is required before Hereford Town Council can assume the civic standing of its predecessors.
Home Secretary Jack Straw is expected to advise Her Majesty that re-conferring such status by charter is the best solution.
Town councillors will be updated when they meet tonight as a finance, appointments and urgent business committee.
A series of Royal charters have granted Hereford city status over several centuries. The Queen approved the latest of these following local government reorganisation in the 1970s.
When Herefordshire Council was created in 1998 Charter Trustees assumed the ceremonial functions of the former city authority.
Last year, the Government allowed Hereford to have a Town Council holding parish powers. Moves to restore this authority to city status, through a new charter, have been underway since.
Town Clerk Martin Fellows described the restoration as a matter of 'some sensitivity'.
But the Home Secretary, he said, is expected to advise The Queen that such a move should be approved.
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