Massive council revamp proposed
Move would scrap both Hyndburn and Lancashire authorities
APLAN is being drawn up to scrap every local authority in Lancashire - including Hyndburn - and carve the county into three, as part of controversial moves to redraw the council map in the region.
The Observer understands that members of the ruling Conservative group at Lancashire County Council backed the suggested shake-up at a meeting last weekend.
The authority’s chief executive has now been tasked with putting together a more detailed proposal for government approval, possibly as soon as the beginning of September.
A majority of county councillors would also have to support the changes before they could be pitched to ministers.
Under the plan, the 131-year-old county council would itself be abolished, along with all 12 district authorities - including Hyndburn council - and the two standalone councils in Blackpool and Blackburn with Darwen.
In their place would come three so-called ‘unitary’ councils covering central and southern parts of the county, a broad western and northern area, and the east (Hyndburn, Rossendale, Blackburn with Darwen, Burnley, and Pendle).
The move comes little more than a month after Lancashire’s 15 council leaders tentatively agreed to take the next steps along the county’s four-year long journey towards striking a devolution deal with the government to gain additional powers and cash for the county.
They made an in-principle commitment to the creation of a combined authority and elected mayor – and agreed to ask experts from the Local Government Association (LGA) to help draft plans to reorganise the county’s complex council structure. However, the LGA declined, because of likely disunity in the county over the issue.
Their assessment may yet prove prescient, with the county council’s proposal now being drafted without any consultation with the district authorities – some of which favour the status quo.
Crucially, the government does not require unanimous agreement among councils for any proposed changes.
If Whitehall considers that it is in meaningful discussions over reshaping the local authority landscape in Lancashire, it is likely that next year’s county elections will be cancelled.
It is believed that ministers would like to see any new unitary councils in place by May 2022, when elections to the freshly-created authorities would take place. That would mean extending the four-year term of the current crop of county councillors for a further 12 months.
LCC’s Conservative leader Councillor Geoff Driver has previously said the county would have to accept the requirements for an elected mayor and council reorganisation if it wanted to be part of the ‘levelling up agenda’ to rebalance the economy, as promoted by the Prime Minister following last year’s general election.
Coun Driver said: “For far too long Lancashire has missed out on the benefits of devolution because of internal squabbles about how our structures are organised. It’s time to set aside petty politicking and break that logjam.
“These bold and ambitious proposals represent a once- i n- a- generation change that will transform Lancashire and benefit everyone who lives in this great county.”
However, opposition leaders at County Hall have condemned the timing of the reorganisation proposal.
Labour group leader Councillor Azhar Ali said Lancashire was being ‘sold down the river’.
“I would have thought that this was the time for all councillors to work together to lobby government for more money, after over half a billion pounds of cuts to the county over the last ten years – and not a reorganisation where you end up putting money into sacking people without actually knowing what you’re going to get in return from devolution,” he said.
“Last week, Transport for the North received £600m of funding – and not a penny of it came to Lancashire.
“I’m shocked that while the country is in a crisis, the only thing the Lancashire Conservatives can think about is reorganising the deckchairs on the Titanic to save their own jobs,” he added.
At a full council meeting earlier this month, the Labour group said that it would reluctantly support a combined authority and elected mayor as part of efforts to secure a devolution deal.
However, the Liberal Democrats at County Hall are opposed to both reorganisation and the proposed new mayor.
Group leader Councillor David Whipp said it was ‘not the right thing and not the right time’.
He said: “It is beyond belief that while we are dealing with a public health emergency, the people who ought to be working their socks off to help keep people alive are instead staring at their naval.
“Energy and effort will now be diverted into these endless discussions, which will only end up with local residents losing control. Power must be available at the most local level, so that people are able to influence decisions – to lose that would be a tragedy.”
At this early stage, there are no details on the impact of any new local government structure in Lancashire on the number of local authority jobs in the region.
However, the union Unison said that it was ‘keeping a close eye on developments’.