Bidders invited to step up to the plate as historic sale begins

Prospective buyers now have one month to submit their bids, with the sale then expected to go through subject to final approval by council officers.

Proceeds from the impending sale will then go back into the council budget and help protect important services.

Councillor Debra Coupar, Leeds City Council’s deputy leader and executive member for resources, said:  "This is a very exciting opportunity for someone to buy a piece of Leeds history while at the same time helping us address what is an incredibly difficult financial situation."

When the Motor Car Act was passed in 1903 it required all cars to have number plates. At that time, local resident Rowland Winn, a founding member of the Automobile Association, bought the U1 plate, which was the very first one issued in Leeds.

When his friend Arthur Currer Briggs was elected Lord Mayor of Leeds that year, Mr Winn gifted the U1 plate to him to use on his civic vehicle, and it has been used by Lord Mayors of Leeds ever since.

Mr Winn, one of the city’s first car dealers, was himself later elected Lord Mayor of Leeds in 1938-39. He retired from public life in the 1950s and was awarded the Freedom of the City in 1956, in recognition of his contribution to the city’s life and prosperity.  

Once the sale of the plate is formally completed, it will be replaced on the Lord Mayor’s civic vehicle by L6EDS, a plate also owned by the council, but which is substantially less valuable.

ENDS