West Suffolk

West Suffolk District is a local government district in Suffolk, England. It was established in 2019 as a merger of the previous Forest Heath District with the Borough of St Edmundsbury. The council is based in Bury St Edmunds, the district's largest town. The district also contains the towns of Brandon, Clare, Haverhill, Mildenhall and Newmarket, along with numerous villages and surrounding rural areas. The neighbouring districts are Mid Suffolk, Babergh, Braintree, South Cambridgeshire, East Cambridgeshire, King's Lynn and West Norfolk and Breckland. History Prior to West Suffolk's creation, its predecessors Forest Heath District Council and St Edmundsbury Borough Council had been working together for a number of years, having had shared a joint chief executive since 2011. The two districts were formally merged into a new district of West Suffolk with effect from 1 April 2019. The new district has the same name as the former administrative county of West Suffolk, which was abolished in 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972, but the new district covers a slightly smaller area than the pre-1974 county, which had also included areas now in the Babergh and Mid Suffolk districts.