Characteristic Communities and all that...

Following the Morpeth Herald report on the kerfuffle at Full Council over 'characteristic communities' and 'belonging communities' - here's a quick rundown of what is being suggested...

Basically, Northumberland is just too large. Some council functions need to be more local, so current proposals are that the unitary authority will be subdivided into three 'characteristic communities' [horrible term] which will have their own Development Control, Licensing and Area Committees - drawn from the 20-25 councillors representing that area.

These are likely to be i) North Northumberland (Alnwick & Berwick districts) ii) SE Northumberland (Blyth Valley, Wansbeck and the coast up to Amble) and iii) West Northumberland (Tynedale and the rest of Castle Morpeth). The main points of contention are a) several but not all of the coastal villages want to be linked to Morpeth (or Alnwick) not SE Northumberland b) whether Morpeth fits better with Tynedale or Alnwick & Berwick. I'm afraid this latter point has dwindled into a political argument with the LibDems wanting Morpeth in their northern stronghold and the Tories wanting Morpeth as part of their Tynedale stronghold.

Personally - I think Morpeth and parts of Tynedale look more to the Tyne & Wear city-region for employment, shopping, housing market and leisure and should be in a separate characteristic community reflecting this. Failing this - I guess the West Northumberland community is next nearest.

Then, there'll also be around 26 'belonging communities' [even more horrible term] - generally a cluster of 4-7 parishes, with a community forum including the 2-3 councillors representing that area, possibly representatives from the parish councils, and unelected 'community & voluntary sector' reps. These will mainly be advisory 'sounding boards' for the local councils - at least at first.

Overall - I think the new unitary will be hardpushed just to deliver its statutory functions for the first 4-5 years - and it'll be a chance for those who argue that we'd be better off without 'continual council interference' to test their argument.

Latest on Local Government Restructure

Just for clarification - the current situation (as I understand it) is:
There will be elections to a transitional unitary authority for Northumberland on May 1st this year.

There will be 67 councillors elected on the existing County Council divisions - and the Council will have a conventional leader and cabinet from the majority party group or a coalition. There'll be no directly elected leader or cabinet as was suggested earlier.
On the current County Council - Labour has a majority of just three over Tories & LibDems combined - but then the Tories & LibDems don't combine very well. If - just supposing - Labour lose some seats and both Tories & LibDems gain some, there'll be no overall control - and there'll be a need to build a coalition. A scenario that holds opportunities should one or two Greens get elected - especially if they have a track record of working well with all parties concerned?

Anyway...
The County Council will be abolished immediately - so the new transitional authority will take on the County Council powers immediately. In fact, it'll be hard to lose the impression that the county council will just turn into the unitary authority - though strictly speaking that isn't the case.

Then over the course of the coming year, the transitional authority will steadily take over the responsibilities of the district councils (including CMBC) - and in April 2009, the district councils will be abolished.

The transitional authority councillors will become unitary authority councillors without a further election - and will hold office till May 2013. The town and parish councils will remain in existence - but they won't hold elections till May 2013 either - so the Morpeth Town councillors you elected last May will serve a six year term! Bet you didn't expect that when you elected them!

Sounds fun, huh?

And all this because Government has been convinced that it will be more cost-effective than the present set-up - and the assumption has been made that the voters and council tax payers would prefer lower taxes to accountability and transparency.

Unitary Proposals could export jobs

A couple of years ago, Northumberland County Council carried out some groundbreaking work on local procurement with the New Economics Foundation.
This “LM3” study showed that money spent on procurement with local businesses benefited the local economy by three times as much as money spent with businesses outside the area.
And yet, proposals for the new unitary authority suggest outsourcing service delivery to a joint company shared with Cambridgeshire and Hampshire, likely to be based in Hampshire.

Outsourcing may possibly save money for the council but if it exports jobs and drains money from the county then its going to cost the local economy far more than is saved.

In fact, I’m surprised that the NE Chamber of Commerce is supporting proposals which could do so much damage to the local economy quite so strongly.

The County Council have a good reputation for local procurement and supporting social enterprise. The District Councils have some very good teams in place delivering high quality services, which are likely to be broken up in the restructure.
If we’re going ahead with the restructure, and if outsourcing is a must – then surely it should be possible to create local businesses to deliver services saving jobs and supporting the local economy in the process rather exporting jobs to the south.

Interactive Leaflet 9 - Unitary Authority?

We may be getting a change in local government in the next couple of years with the abolition of both District and County Councils and their replacement by either one or two ‘unitary authorities’.

There's a consultation of 'key stakeholders' going on at the moment - that doesn't include the general public or any community organisations - deadline 22nd June - with the Government announcing what we're going to get in July.

Of course - its outrageous

- its outrageous that the government is imposing this change without any sort of referendum, but then we did give them the 'wrong answer' on regional government, so we can't be trusted

- its outrageous that the County Council pre-empted any discussion by declaring they'd be bidding for a single unitary authority within hours of the Government announcement, and brought their Cabinet up to speed a few weeks later - and then fudged the full council decision

- its outrageous that the District Councils 'played the game' by counter-bidding with a two unitary model, again without any real consultation (though as a loyal member of CMBC Executive Board, I'm of course fully behind the two unitary bid)

- its outrageous that Government 'bottled it' and did not choose a single option for consultation, thereby blighting any chance of co-operative working between County and Districts for another six months

But outrage won't get us far... Some parties are suggesting a private referendum - but this would take £120,000 of tax payers money with no guarantee that the Government will pay it heed.

So - we must try to get the best out of what is on offer...

As we see it, this change is all about

• more cost-effective centralised services
• meeting the different needs of urban and rural Northumberland
• and local accountability.

As a party, we feel that local accountability is most important and we’ll be looking to maximise this in all options under consideration.

And, whatever the outcome, the Town Council will become far more significant under unitary government so the results of this election are really important.