喜樂美語
  1. 1nB2/ˌloʊkəl əˈθɔːrəti/地方政府（地方當局）

    The official group of people who run the government of one town, city, or area, and who look after local services there, such as schools.

    示範例句 · Example

    The local authority plans to close the school at the end of the year.

    逐字地方當局計畫在年底關閉這所學校。

    It names a body of people, not one official. Longman gives it as the group responsible for the government of a particular area, town, or city in the UK, and its Local Authority entry adds that part of one is responsible for education in its area. Wiktionary puts it more widely, as an administrative body in local government, such as a city council, with no country attached. So the sources agree on what it is and differ on how tightly it is tied to Britain. Two more things travel with it. It is set against central government, the government of the whole country. And British writers may treat it as a group of people rather than a single thing, so the evidence shows both the local authority plans and the local authority plan.

    local 是在地的，authority 是有權作決定的單位。合起來指管一個城鎮或地區的官方機關，也就是我們說的地方政府。它管的都是在地的事：學校、道路、垃圾、建照。來源特別說明，英國的 Local Authority 有一部分負責教育。維基詞典講得比較寬，只說是地方政府裡的行政機關，例如市議會。這個詞在英國的用法最常見。跟它相對的是 central government，也就是中央政府。英式英語有時把它當成「一群人」，所以後面的動詞可能是單數 plans，也可能是複數 plan，兩種寫法來源都收了。

    常見搭配

    • the local authority

      地方政府

      the council that runs one town or area

      The local authority owns this building.

    • local authority housing

      地方政府的公有住宅

      homes owned by the council and rented to local people

      They live in local authority housing near the park.

    • apply to the local authority

      向地方政府申請

      to send an official request to the council

      You must apply to the local authority for a licence.

    • local authority funding

      地方政府的經費

      money given out by the council

      The museum lost its local authority funding last year.

    意思相近

    councilcity councillocal governmenttown hall

    意思相反

    central governmentnational government

core核心畫面

Think of government sitting on two levels. One level is far away and decides for the whole country. The other sits in your own town and decides about this street, this school, this week's rubbish collection. A local authority is the nearer level: a body of people, never one official, whose power stops at the edge of one area. That is why the word local is doing so much work here, and why the term usually turns up next to the school, the housing, the licence, the bins.

可以想成政府分成兩層。一層在遠處，替全國作決定；另一層就在你住的城鎮，管這條街、這所學校、這星期的垃圾。local authority 指的是比較近的那一層。它是一群人組成的機關，不是某一位官員，而且權力只到這個地區的邊界為止。local 這個字在這裡承擔了最重要的訊息，所以這個詞旁邊常常出現學校、住宅、許可證、垃圾這些字。

複數 local authorities

意思相近

councilcity councillocal governmenttown hall

意思相反

central governmentnational government

原始詞典資料1 筆記錄

以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，摘錄並精簡格式，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。

local authoritynoun

  • 1

    An administrative body in local government, such as a city council.

    • Some preliminary legal arrangements were made, but the scheme proceeded no further, as the various local authorities concerned were unwilling to speculate public funds on what was, even at that date, a will o' the wisp.
    • Controversy has surrounded some of the schemes, which local authorities and commuters have seen as putting money-making before travel.

摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary，已精簡格式；依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用，改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。