Ros writes in Eastern Agenda magazine, Autumn 2006

Local Government

We live in one of the most centralised states in Western Europe and, after the effects of the long awaited local government White Paper have been felt, that will remain the case. The White Paper proved a wasted opportunity and not worth the wait of the many months that it has taken to get it into print. It does nothing to address the increasingly unsustainable burden of council tax or to deal with the dominance of central government funding for local government services. For it is that lack of local financial independence which is at the core of the weakness of modern local government. Despite the rhetoric, there is no devolution here - the White Paper does nothing to return the powers of central government or quangos back to town halls.

The document is full of motherhood and apple pie, as the Government now claim to to have discovered localism and decentralisation. Of course we welcome their conversion to the idea, but should remain deeply sceptical about whether they have any real understanding of it. The implementation is via a zoo of acronyms and action plans, all of which have the capacity to blur genuine accountability.

The Government remain besotted with the notion of mayors. So far there have been 34 local referendums resulting in 22 rejections and 12 wins. That has been the choice of local communities and I have no problems with Mayors if that is genuinely what local people wish to have. But Mr Blair wants more mayors and so Mr Blair shall get more mayors. We are going to get them through consultation now rather than referendums. If you do not want a mayor, you can have an “enhanced” leader. This is the imposition of the mayoral system by the back door. The Government is determined to emasculate back-bench councillors in the same way as it has emasculated Back-Bench MPs.

There is a proposal to allow some areas that have already expressed an interest to become unitary councils if they choose to do so, and we should welcome local determination as a sensible way forward. But huge questions remain about the exact nature of the triggers for this and how consent will be determined. Who will have a vote in such a proposal and who will make the final decision?

The exact proposals for parishes are unclear, but giving very local communities more say in service delivery and local well-being is of course to be welcomed, provided that democratic accountability is not lost. A right to initiate a call to action must not turn into mob rule, and principal councils must retain the capacity to take strategic decisions and deliver big services for the benefit of the whole community. If it is left to the sheer weight of numbers, the fix-the-pothole lobby will always be larger than the special-educational-needs lobby, but that does not make it right.

It’s a pity that the White Paper has been published ahead of the Lyons review so that the issues of powers,  finance and structures will not be considered together despite the fact that they are inextricably linked. The failure to link these important issues will probably ensure that, even by its own meagre objectives, this White Paper is doomed to fail.