Monday, November 21, 2005
Unitary authorities
Miliband's plan to purge Tory Councillors
South Shields MP and Cabinet Minister for Communities and Local Government, David Miliband has hatched a scheme to rid the Conservative Party of a huge swathe of it's most loyal and devoted local councillors. Couched in the best "spin speak" of New Labour's liturgy, his internal memorandum to "two jags" Prescott proposes an end to the two-tier structure of district and county councils that operates across much of the country.
It also dovetails nicely with the current ideas to reduce the number of police forces in a process of "regionalisation", which is already running into trouble - Cleveland Constabulary, for instance, has vowed to fight for it's independence rather than joining a regional force with Durham and Northumbria.
The key to the reform would be the creation of all-purpose unitary authorities to replace either the counties or the districts in the 34 English shire counties, most of which are under Tory control. Alongside these new unitary authorities will also be the regional assemblies, those unelected producers of hot air which refuse to go away, even after "two jags" received a black eye from the electors of the North-East when they convincingly rejected his proposals for an elected assembly in last year's referendum - Read more here.
It seems to me that larger bodies for larger geographical areas are what New Labour are driving towards, it kind of goes against the job title "communities and local government" don't you think David?
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