Over 100 senior councillors recently had a meeting with Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles and his team in Birmingham. They outlined their vision for local government, explained the announcements already made and stressed the savings the local public sector would need to find.
Then Eric, Bob Neill and Joan Hanham took over an hour of questions from an audience keen to know the details and likely impact on their own councils.
This meeting was an important signal that the coalition is determined that national government never again loses touch with local government. With powers being devolved from the centralised state to local councils and communities, ongoing connections and relationships between both tiers have taken on a new importance.
The Local Government Association leadership and other senior Town Hall figures are in with Ministers on a weekly basis. If anything, this open-door approach is likely to increase as local government brings forward a variety of approaches to reorganise and find major savings whilst protecting, even enhancing, local services.
With the budget announced, local government now knows the scale of the task before us. If we are going to search out different and cheaper ways of operating before we even consider reducing essential services, then we are going to have to stop thinking about what works best for councils and concentrate on what works best for those we serve.
Now that Whitehall is getting off our back, we have the opportunity to find different and distinctive ways of running, commissioning or scrutinising local public services. Instead of Cumbria’s solutions being determined in SW1, Cumbria can now decide what works best for Cumbria. And finally we might get Local Government that is local and actually governs rather than simply delivers services according to centralised diktat.
( 8 comments ) Tags: Bob Neill, Council, Eric Pickles, Local Government, town hall, Whitehall
Comment by Kevin McNamara on June 28, 2010 at 11:38 am
not a conservative, but i am very happy to read this. it is a wonderful idea
Comment by RG on June 28, 2010 at 2:41 pm
Cuts are inevitable so townhall fatcats need to have their ridiculous salaries cut aswell.
That would go along way ot fairness.
Comment by Tom I Balmain on June 28, 2010 at 2:47 pm
It is great to hear that locally elected councillors will be in charge once again instead of Whitehall Dictators. I will be very happy when I hear that 99% of quangoes have been abolished. Now if we can rid of 95% of the Health & Safety nonsense that would be another great leap forward.
I consider if we get 3 years freeze in Council Tax then we will once again get value for money from local councils.
Comment by Johnny Norfolk on June 28, 2010 at 3:57 pm
So does that mean that planning decisions will be made localy insted of being overturned for something like a supermarket. If it does not include this it counts for nothing.
Comment by Tanya Headley on June 29, 2010 at 3:02 pm
Could we not have a suggestion page on this blog for people who could try to come up with solutions to help save some money. Afterall, the public can also see where the waste is in within public services when they try to access them? This might help ministers come up with some ideas for their own departments.
Comment by Clive Pinder on June 30, 2010 at 9:53 am
Another nail in the coffin of statism. Excellent news. The problem is that there seems to be a vaccum of hard policy on local planning with our Tory led Council (Basingstoke & Deane) refusing to halt the SHLAA process for fear of “creating a planning vaccum” that developers will exploit. Surely this is not what Eric Pickles and his team intended? Alot of anger over this locally which is spoiling all the good work being done.
Comment by Mark on July 14, 2010 at 10:11 pm
I pretty much agree with everything written on the follow blog
http://blogs.menmedia.co.uk/politics/2010/07/men-column-a-radical-devolution-package/
I’ve been watching with some surprise and optimism some of the noises the Tories have been making about a more devolutionary and partnership based approach to local government and economic development… but then listen with dismay as some of the detail has come out, seemingly betraying the Tories’ lack of understanding of some of the key issues.
Lets hope sense prevails at Pickles Towers and we see moves put in place to genuinely empower local communities, business and councils to shape their area rather than the gesture-politics allied to a power and funding grab that seems to be the way the coalition is headed.
Comment by Brian Edmonds on August 3, 2010 at 3:53 pm
The transfer of councils to local control would be assisted if councillors were obliged to hold surgeries like MPs. Surgeries were held when councillors put public interest before personal interest and expenses ran well below £30,000 pa.