Upper Hunter Shire

The Upper Hunter Shire is a local government area in the Upper Hunter Valley of New South Wales, Australia. The Shire was formed in May 2004 from the Scone Shire and parts of Murrurundi and Merriwa shires.

The mayor of the Upper Hunter Shire Council is Cr. Maurice Collison, following the sudden resignation of Wayne Bedggood as mayor and as a councillor on 9 June 2020. No reason has been given for the sudden resignation.

Council's General Manager is Greg McDonald.^{[citation needed]}

The towns of the Upper Hunter are Scone, Parkville, Aberdeen, Murrurundi, and Merriwa, as well as several villages, including Bunnan, Gundy, Moonan Flat, Ellerston, Wingen, Blandford and Cassilis. Of the towns, only Aberdeen on the Shire's southeastern border is situated on the Hunter River.

The Upper Hunter Shire has a number of heritage-listed sites, including:

At the 2021 census, there were 14,229 people in the Upper Hunter Shire local government area, of these 50.0 percent were male and 50.0 percent were female. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 7.0 percent of the population, which was higher than the national and state averages of 3.4 and 3.2 percent respectively. The median age of people in the Upper Hunter Shire was 42 years, which was marginally higher than the national median of 38 years. Children aged 0 – 14 years made up 18.6 percent of the population and people aged 65 years and over made up 21.2 percent of the population. Of people in the area aged 15 years and over, 47.3 per cent were married and 13.1 per cent were either divorced or separated.

Population growth in the Upper Hunter Shire between the 2006 census and the 2011 census was 6.00 percent. When compared with the total population growth of Australia for the same period, at 8.32 percent, population growth in the Upper Hunter Shire local government area was slightly lower than the national average. The median weekly income for residents within the Upper Hunter Shire was marginally lower than the national average.

At the 2021 census, the proportion of residents in the Upper Hunter Shire local government area who stated their ancestry as Australian or English exceeded 85 percent of all residents (the national average was 62.9 percent). In excess of 29% of all residents in the Upper Hunter Shire nominated a religious affiliation with Anglican at the 2021 census, which was considerably higher than the national average of 9.8 percent. Meanwhile, as at the 2021 census date, compared to the national average, households in the Upper Hunter Shire local government area had a significantly lower than average proportion (5.3 percent) where two or more languages are spoken (the national average was 24.8 percent); and a significantly higher proportion 89.5 percent where only English was spoken at home (the national average was 72.0 percent).