The long-awaited Conservative Green Paper on local government was unveiled this week – with a pledge from the party to be more ‘localist'. But the paper has already been branded a failure by current local government minister, John Healey. Plans for local government under the Tories should have been released under former shadow communities minister, Eric Pickles, in the autumn, but a series of delays followed after it was released to county council leaders. The proposals – many of which were revealed exclusively in The MJ (13 November) – include an end to capping, the abolition of CAA and an end to the Standards Board. In a move to reassure members over reorganisation, the Conservatives will also ‘end all forced amalgamations of local authorities'. Citizens will have more say on how their councils are run, with the chance to veto council tax rises, choose organisational structures, and be able to instigate more referendums. On finance, ring-fencing grants will be phased out, and councils will have the power to levy business rate discounts. Plans have also been mooted to make it easier for councils to raise money through bonds. Many of the plans echo the proposals of the current government, with a pledge to shift power down to citizens – a big favourite with communities' secretary, Hazel Blears. The Conservatives have also backed directly-elected mayors – but only for big cities. Speaking to The MJ, Mr Healey warned councils would face ‘£240m taken out of grants on day one' if the Tories took over government. He added: ‘I think Tory local government will be disappointed by this.' Bedfordshire CC deputy leader, Richard Stay, welcomed the ‘grown-up approach' of what was likely to be the next government. Chair of chief executives society SOLACE, Derek Myers, described the plans as promising. ‘We are pleased to see the confidence shown in local government, which is well justified by the sparkling improvements in performance and efficiency achieved by committed councillors and professional managers working together,' he said. The Tory Green Paper on local government also includes plans to: give councils the powers to levy business rate discounts give councils financial benefits for new businesses and housing give councils a general power of competence introduce directly-elected police commissioners – despite the Government's recent U-turn on elected representatives allow councils to devolve unlimited funding to ward councillors abolish all regional housing and planning powers abolish the government office for London strip the RDAs of powers and hand them to councils
