'The last rotten borough': Why it's time to abolish the City of London Corporation
Secret meetings, archaic elections, and banquets with £62 bottles of red — a former City councillor tells all

Morning — many were blindsided by the news late last year that the historic Smithfield and Billingsgate markets are being shut down. The decision was taken at a private meeting of the City of London Corporation in November, which voted to withdraw its support for the meat and fish markets. Traders are now in the process of finding a new location, hopefully still within the M25.
But the news wasn’t a surprise to Graeme Harrower, a tax lawyer in the City of London since the 1980s who went on to become an independent councillor at the Corporation from 2015 to 2022. He’s also a contributor to the local investigative site Reclaim EC1, which has for years reported on the Corporation’s attempt to relocate the markets, and revealed that the plan was ultimately doomed.
For Graeme, the Smithfield/Billingsgate debacle is yet more evidence that the Corporation — effectively the City’s borough council — is no longer fit for purpose in 2025. Like the markets, the Corporation’s roots go back to the medieval period. “Centuries of history will be brought to an end by an institution that pleads history as the reason for its existence,” he writes in his piece for the Spy today. But Graeme’s criticisms go to the core of the Corporation — a lack of democratic oversight and accountability, leading to poor governance and excess. The job of a City councillor certainly comes with perks: £9,000 cash allowances, free food, accommodation and parking, and splendid banquets at the Guildhall and Mansion House.
Why Graeme and others now believe it’s time to abolish London’s “last rotten borough” — and what they want to replace it with — is below.
FYI: We contacted the City of London Corporation for comment ahead of the publication of this piece, but we have yet to receive a response.
The truth about the City of London Corporation
By Graeme Harrower
Mention “City of London”, and most people will think of the UK’s financial sector. Some may think of London’s geographical core that gave its name to the sector, which was historically – and, to some extent, still is – located there.
Practically no one would think of the City of London Corporation, an institution that has survived for centuries, owns billions of pounds in assets, and manages many organisations and sites precious to Londoners – the Barbican Arts Centre, the London Museum, Hampstead Heath, Epping Forest, and for the time being Smithfield and Billingsgate Markets.
The Corporation exercises local authority functions in the Square Mile, like planning and waste collection. But its extra powers and pursuits, some medieval in origin, make it very different from all other London borough councils.
The Corporation bizarrely has its own police force. It regulates 111 livery companies, which are social and charitable organisations located in the City, some originating as medieval trade guilds. It has a significant portfolio of commercial real estate, and administers a large charitable fund.
It runs three private schools and sponsors ten academies, as well as the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. It owns the Old Bailey courts, which are managed by a central government department. Some of its assets lie outside the Square Mile, like the Heathrow Animal Reception Centre; it even owns commercial property and fisheries in Northern Ireland.
The Corporation accumulated this jumble of private and public functions through historical accident. There is no logic to their combination. As we will see, the Corporation is far less democratic and accountable than its borough council counterparts. Yet it clings to its strange existence through a four-point survival strategy.
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