There is deep irony that while in England local government reorganisation (LGR) envisaged scrapping the two-tier system in favour of unitaries, there are opposite proposals in Scotland – scrapping the unitaries created in 1996 in favour of a two-tier system of regional and hyper-local councils. The timescale for consultation is tight – the end of the year – and the implications for workforces if iimplemented are enormous. The Scottish Government published its consultative proposals for LGR on 21 September, proposing to replace Scotland's 32 unitaries with a two-tier system of six to 10 regional authorities and 120-160 hyper- local community councils.
The former would cover strategic functions like education, planning, waste and economic development while the latter would deliver local services like planning applications and licensing. The Government paper says it wants to ‘find as much common ground as possible' and to reach ‘a shared direction' by the end of the year. Primary legislation to enact the changes will be needed.
