The Councillor was 'The official local government journal of the Conservative & Unionist Party'. The foreword to the first issue, by Geoffrey Hutchinson, Chairman of the Conservative Local Government Advisory Committee, states: 'This magazine, the first issue of which I welcome, is designed to fill a long felt want amongst Conservatives and others who serve on local councils or have ambitions to do so. The Councillor will not be primarily a propagandist publication. Its chief aim will be to record what is going on in local government, so that the individual councillor will be better equipped to take an intelligent and useful part in the work of his Council. We shall endeavour to avoid the technicality of the professional journals. But we shall, nevertheless, seek to present in simple and non-technical language as complete a picture of the complex and changing scene of local government as the existing paper restrictions will allow, bearing in mind that those who serve on the local councils have usually much to read, and that we must not unduly add to their burdens.

There is a long gap in the series held in the Conservative Party Archive, from April 1953 (Vol. V, No.8) through to Spring 1960, which appears to have been the result of a break in production. Other series held elsewhere in the Bodleian and at the British Library also contain the same gap in holdings, but no explanation is given for why production resumed, with a New Series, beginning at Volume 4.

In his foreword to the Spring 1960 edition (Vol. 4, No. 1 of a New Series), RA Butler, then Home Secretary and Conservative Party Chairman stated, 'I am glad to learn that The Councillor is being revived, and I hope that it will become a permanent feature of the Party's Local Government activities. The aim is educative as well as propagandist, for Local Government has to deal with a great variety of problems, some purely local and others with a national background, and it is not easy for our aldermen, councillors and workers in the field of local government to keep abreast of new developments. Central Office does, of course, issue a good deal of material on the subject, but The Councillor will be concerned exclusively with it.'

The Councillor was initially produced monthly, in a 16-page quarto size format, until April 1953. When it resumed publication in 1960, it became quarterly. But otherwise the format was unchanged.

Originally produced by Conservative Central Office, at least from the Winter 1970/1 edition, it was published by the Conservative Political Centre on behalf of the Local Government Department at Central Office. It ceased publication in the Summer of 1972 (Vol. 4, No. 44), and was superseded by Focus on Local Government from Autumn 1972.