Proposals to reduce the number of local councils from three levels to two look increasingly likely. Consultation information can be found on the table near the entrance of Abingdon Library for the ‘One Oxfordshire’ proposal already launched by the leaders of Oxfordshire County Council. Responses to that consultation, which can also be found at http://www.oneoxfordshire.org/, end on 28th February 2017.
The leaders of the Vale of White Horse District Council, and South Oxfordshire, have also announced today that they want to work together with Oxfordshire County Council to develop a proposal for a unitary council that represents the best deal for the people of Oxfordshire. They say they hope all the councils will be involved.
A unitary council running the joint County Council and District Council services would include the following…
County Council Services:
Child protection
Fostering and adoption
Adult social services
Educational Support
Roads and transport
Fire and Rescue service
Waste disposal
Public Health
Libraries
Trading Standards
Countryside access
Parking
District/city council services:
Housing and benfits
Parks and leisure
Local planning
Street cleaning
Waste collection
Environmental health
Concil tax collection
Electoral registration
We will have to see how the proposals develop, but Abingdon Town Council would continue to provide local services in some areas, and might gain some local services as three layers of council is reduced to two.
Abingdon-on-Thames Town Council provides:
Guildhall and Museum
Information Centre
Allotments
Cemeteries
Parks and Open Spaces
Christmas Lights
Market Place, markets and fairs
Fisheries
Abingdon in Bloom
The abolition of The Vale District Council would be nothing but good news for Abingdon.
… for those that want perpetual Tory rule.
When the rural district councils were abolished as part of the 1974 local government reforms (or when it was proposed anyway), they run a campaign ‘don’t vote for Mr R. E. Mote’ with a picture of Mr R. E. Mote as a typical bureaucrat. This time we seem to be going for Mr. R. E. Moter.
A very positive step forward – the three tier structure is beyond stupid. This latest statement from the district authorities sounds much more sensible than their previous proposals and hopefully all the authorities can now focus on bringing a two tier system this into being.
Hear hear, Iain. But as Backstreeter implies, the devil is in the detail – it is important that any re-organisation produces real savings which will enable more resources to be devoted to desperately urgent front-line needs. Some of the ideas beig bandied about do not inspire confidence that this will be the case, but – as always – I live in hope!
Backstreeter’s last point is also important: restructuring offers opportunities for Town Councils to take on greater responsibilities (and funding) and it would be wonderful if they were to grasp this opportunity to bring a greater share of the control of our destiny into local hands.
Where to begin? I suppose it was the abolition of borough councils and the subsequent creation of district councils back in the 70’s? The old boroughs became little more than parish councils and had most, if not all of their assets transferred to the newly created district councils, (which in our case was things like multi story car park, precinct, old gaol, abbey meadows etc) it didn’t take long before joe public became aware that there was now three “authorities” to pay for ( and deal with ) the upshot was the creation of Unitary councils, these proved ver popular in the north.
However, a unitary council generally meant the abolition of the district council, which if you were a district council employee or councillor, was not a favourable route.
In an effort to stop being swallowed up by the all conquering county council/unitary council it became popular for district councils to amalgamate with neighbouring district councils,( west Ox did it with Cotswold) so under the guise that joining forces with South Oxfordshire DC would save the tax payer money, the Vsle joined up with SODC.
It would be really interesting to see if that coupling actually saved anybody anything? We still had two council leaders and there was a time when we had two CEO’s two ( both on £100k plus)
OCC have long been trying to forge a unitary council out of the district councils, but the D C’ have refused to discuss the issue, however, the revelation by SODC and the Vale to begin negotiations with OCC is I think, not as one might think? I’m being led into thinking the two district councils want to abolish the existing county council and I think that would be significantly worse than we already have?
Iain and co, be interested in hearing your thoughts?
It will be interesting to see what comes out of the discussions, I think it is definitely a really positive sign that the district and county authorities are talking rather than proposing separate models.
For me it’s a zero brain decision – merging a couple of spdistrict authorities together wont save much – frankly sodc and vowhdc are virtually unified anyway so there’s not much advantage to be had.
I want to see a single county wide authority undertaking all strategic responsibilities, making difficult cross-community decisions such as strategic housing plans, and anything where there are advantages to scale.
I think the remaining activities where the requirements will be driven by more local decisions should be delegated to parish (or equivalent) level.
I, as usual, agree with Hester that the devil is in the detail, and there are plenty of grey areas. I hope our local councillors will step up to the mark and make sure they are taking decisions in the public interest and not just protecting their own institutions.
I find myself in the bizarre position of agreeing with Iain on much of this matter …
The redundancy built into the triple-layer council structure is, obviously, wasteful. Nice jobs and expenses for the boys (and gals), but one layer to many of obfuscation when it comes to relating to the electorate and just encouraging the ‘pass the parcel’ Blame Game. Being a councilor … an ideal role for someone who likes lots to authority and no responsibility ….
However, should this unification happen I think the opportunity to integrate adequately funded Neighbourhood Plans should be grasped. ‘Neighbourhoods’ should be defined on a ‘human scale’ which people can relate to … much of what The Vale has done to Abingdon just seems opportunist asset-stripping and I’d hate to think that any of The Vale politicians/officers have anything to do with whatever structure we end up with.
Instead of copying what everyone else is doing this is an opportunity to do something new and create s structure where non-politically aligned community groups are heavily involved and operate in a totally open matter.
I think you’d get better people involved in working to the town’s benefit if they didn’t have to spend time in rooms listening to party apparatchiks/professionally-waged politicians drone on and the electorate would like it a lot better if ‘it’s too complicated for you’ and ‘it’s commercially confidential’ disappeared from the lexicon of excuses.
After all … it appears that the time has passed when politicians got the respect they thought they were entitled to and now they’re getting the respect they’re actually entitled to.
Iain, I concur too, but as Hester said the devil will be in the detail and if the statement in today’s Herald is anything to go by “Matt Barber is seeking protection for their cash reserves” then I am totally confused! I thought the idea is to remove the middle layer of council? Clearly though that’s not the intention of the district council? I fear the creation of a monster !
Whilst i also agree with those above in principle; when has anything like this ever worked out for the good of “the people”. I’d be at least partially reassured if Misters Hudsputh, Barber and Nimo-Smith were gauanteed to be as far removed from the whole thing as is possible. Alas, i fear, this is all just a new and innovative way to make things better “for them”, but to screw us all over in a new and intetesting way.
Always happy to be proved wrong though.
Can someone please explain to me why the Vale insist on keeping their pot? Isn’t the plan to abolish the district councils? If so their assets should surely be apportioned to the then appropriate OCC or town council? What are they on about? The public need more info !
This looks like a real opportunity for Abingdon – does the Town Council have the skills to grasp the nettle?
so far nobody seems worried that the lead in this proposal is the one council that has failed to budget and has slashed services left, right and center.
A reorganisation is desirable, but not under the county leadership. They are just interested in getting their hands on more assets to balance their incompetent balance sheets. … Oh and hey council tax will be unified … one can guess they will be put up to meet the top levels in Oxford.
Goodbye to local democracy and many local services (remember the childrens centers …)
Normally I would stand up for more localised power and representation but Oxford council – run or misrun by Labour for aeons- has been incredibly corrupt, antagonistic to many groups of people and obstructive to small businesses. So I believe the only way to make the people who run the city more accountable, is to remove their belief that they don’t need to be accountable. That can happen, if we have the Labour majority rule replaced with being a minority of votes in a unitary trust. So even though I can’t stand the Tories, I would vote for a unitary council. Yes, some folks sadly will lose their jobs but local government needs to function better. Moreover, removing duplication of some jobs will result in cost savings, which is sensible when both the Tories and Labour are forcing cuts on public spending.