Title

So, the dust is settling on the new government arrangements, and the coalition programme for governance is being pored over across the nation. Apologies for adding to the already-many column inches of detailed analysis, but what is the point of having a column if I can't share my views? Abdool Kara is chief executive at Swale Borough Council. First, the coalition document does not have a coherent, overriding narrative. I guess that should be expected, as the product of a coalition – it represents the intersection of the Venn diagrams of each party's manifesto [diagrams which show all hypothetically-possible logical relations between a finite collection of sets] where agreement could be reached about a way forward. That's why it deals with everything from rogue wheel-clampers to our nuclear deterrent. It is also difficult to be principled at a time of difficult finances – a need to find quick savings leads to a list of immediate opportunities, rather than principled, long-term decision-taking. Looking at the issues related to local government, there are some themes around transparency, although these seem to disregard the added costs which will be an additional burden on councils. I identified with David Clark, director general of SOLACE, when he asked what the rationale was for the limit for publishing expenditure by the civil service to be 50 times higher than for local government. And Total Place faces a real danger of dying a death as a CLG game which none of the other Whitehall departments want to play – possibly because they don't understand it, or perhaps because the new ministers want to keep hold of their new-found power. With the CLG minister pronouncing his priorities as ‘localism, localism, localism', it seems that, rather like razors with ever more blades, triple localism replaces double devolution. What next, quadruple communities? But, beyond the rhetoric, there is a distinct sense that the localism in the document is about by-passing local government to connect with third sector organisations and individuals – where is the council-friendly new localism that we were led to expect? We have to ask where this distrust of local government comes from, not least from Cabinet ministers with a local government background? Certainly, there have been some high-profile failures. But, with around 400 councils, there are always likely to be some authorities at that end of the bell curve. We need to better-understand why ministers distrust local government, and then build that trust, or we will remain the whipping boys for budget cuts rather than the co-producers of a new and better way of doing things.

Title

WHITEHALL

Plugged In

SUBSCRIBE TO CONTINUE READING