The town of Hartlepool was an ancient borough, having been granted a charter by King John in 1200.

This borough covered the relatively small area now known as the Headland, where the original town was located.

[12][13] The borough was reformed and enlarged on 1 April 1974, by the merger of the previous county borough of Hartlepool, along with the parishes of Brierton, Claxton, Dalton Piercy, Elwick, Elwick Hall, Greatham, Hart and Newton Bewley, from the Stockton Rural District, all of which had been part of the administrative county of Durham.

[14] Cleveland was abolished in 1996 following the Banham Review, which gave unitary authority status to its four districts, including Hartlepool.

[16] Political control of the council since the 1974 reforms has been as follows:[23][24] Non-metropolitan district Unitary authority Since 2013 the role of mayor has been largely ceremonial in Hartlepool.

Between 2002 and 2013, Hartlepool was one of a small number of councils in the United Kingdom to have a directly elected mayor.

[25] The first mayoral election was held in May 2002, and became famous for being won by the mascot of Hartlepool United F.C., 'H'Angus the Monkey',[26] with a majority of approximately 500 over the second-placed Labour Party candidate.

[36] Prior to that it was based at the Municipal Buildings on Church Square, which had been built in 1889 for the old West Hartlepool Borough Council.