Quote:
Originally Posted by g jones
The referendum will be in Feb or May (dependeing on cost) and will be one question. Its a turn around as Labour Councillors were told a referendum for the name change was too expensive only 3 weeks ago. This new policy announcement was released via the newspapers again without much discussion at the Council.
Q. Do you want your district to have a Town or Parish Council administered by Accrington and Districts Council?
I believe the renaming issue is in chaos. This new policy is to mask that and again is policy on the hoof.
My comments in the Ob were slightly distorted. We have looked at the issue of Town and Parish Councils and there are too many problems as Willow & Claytonender point out.
We have have had a County Council delegation to discuss the structures and powers, as well as Parish & Town Councillors form Burnley & Ribble Valley give their views. PB has had little of this and jumped the gun. Labour Councillors are slightly split against the idea at the last discussion we had on the matter.
It's a new tier of bureaucaracy. A lot of services can't be divided. Where they can Borough will be the contractor and Town or Parish the customer creating unnecessary paperwork. Important economic decisions about employment sites etc.. become hugely problematic and what about logos and stationery etc.. Running the bureaucracy will cost £50-£100 extra in Council Tax (which has happened in Altham already) eventually and may not provide much more in terms of services. Then the cost of the democratic process is high. These are just a few issues.
There are some advantages but it's hard to look beyond the bang for buck argument of costing too much for too little.
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I take it that the structure of these councils would remain as is? With a Chairman and up to nine co-optees, all unelected by the general public? Or would these individuals be elected by us at democratically held elections, as the old urban town councils used to be?
This urgently needs clarification, because if the people on the councils are unelected, and in charge of such important things as financial budgets, I can foresee chaos. Also the new 'independent' councils could be hijacked, and taken over by one particular group and their cronies, and run as Quangos, which is a very frightening thought indeed.
As for the wording of the referendum question, pathetic!
If Britcliffe doesn't care one way or the other, as he reportedly said recently, this seems like he's desperately clutching at straws, and using the parish councils issue to bulldoze the name change through.
The two things are, and should remain, two separate issues.