The Welsh Church Commissioners (whose full official title was "The Commissioners for Church Temporalities in Wales")[a] were set up by the Welsh Church Act 1914 to deal with the disendowment of the Church of England in Wales, as part of its disestablishment. Their task was to ascertain which ecclesiastical assets the future Church in Wales should retain, and which should be transferred to local authorities, and to various Welsh national institutions. They were required to transfer those assets which the Church in Wales was entitled to retain to the Representative Body of the Church in Wales. The remaining assets were to be transferred to the thirteen county councils and four county borough councils which existed in Wales until 1974, and to the University of Wales and its constituent colleges. For various reasons which are explained below, the process took considerably longer than was first envisaged. The commissioners could not ultimately be wound up until 1947. The assets transferred constituted the "Welsh Church Act Funds" of the respective institutions. The county and county borough councils (both the councils originally bearing those titles, and their post-1996 unitary successors) hold the funds for charitable and other purposes. The funds are still in existence.[1]
As part of their responsibilities, the Welsh Church Commissioners also organised the border polls which were held in 1915 (and again in two places in 1916) in parishes which straddled the administrative border between England and Wales.
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