While latest polls showing the gap between Conservatives and Labour slightly reducing, the ikelihood is the former will be the next Government – and they are certainly acting as such. Last week, shadow local government spokesman, Bob Neill, told his party conference that a Tory Government would cancel any plans for further local government restructuring in Devon, Norfolk and Suffolk. Note that this was no longer a case of the shadow front bench expressing its long-standing opposition to reorganisation. Last week, it simply announced it would scrap the plans, even if they had already proceeded to secondary legislation before a general election, in which case, it would revoke the clauses. In effect, the entire process is now in mothballs, even though there is six months to go before an election. The shadow front bench's opposition to unitaries has not been without critics from within its local party, with many county Tories in favour of single-tiers. While Mr Neill said last week that reorganisation was expensive, new unitary – and Tory-led – Wiltshire, for one, believes it will save £18m over less than three years (see The MJ, 3 September). And this week, the Conservatives, this time at local level, also took a view on the Government's amendment to its Local Government Bill, which seeks to mitigate the damage from the recent High Court case over LAML. The court case has been a setback for local government ministers who earlier this year were lecturing town and county halls to use their wellbeing powers more proactively. The LAML case is a threat to wellbeing which the Government's amendment seeks to remove, but which the LGA believes is insufficient. Supporters of more powers are, therefore, drawing up a legal blueprint for a power of general competence to present, not to this Government – but the next. One might well ask why current ministers should also not be lobbied although the answer is increasingly obvious. To paraphrase a famous quote, they are regarded as being in office but in the long term, not in power. Michael Burton, Editor, The MJ
