Surrey County Conservatives support localism – Lib-Dems oppose it (30th April)

*Localism: Our vision of localism is one where power is decentralised to the lowest possible level.

Tuesday’s meeting of Surrey County Council saw widespread support for proposals to devolve more powers to local authorities, local communities & local councillors. During a debate on ‘Control Shift’ a Conservative ‘Green Paper’ on local government, support was received from Conservative Members as well as the RA/IND opposition Group.

Conservative members said under the Labour Government, local government had been stripped of their powers and that targets and diktats had replaced local initiatives – with Labour trying to tie councils into adopting their centralist policies in return for an empty promise of extra monies (even when local people hadn’t voted for them). This was condemned as undemocratic and against the wishes of local people.

Conservative Group Leader Andrew Povey called for regional powers to be returned to local authorities and spoke of local authorities devolving powers to communities, parishes and individuals and he expressed a concern that the political system had been skewed by centralisation.

“Far too many powers that should be at a local level are being exercised at a regional or national level, and even when powers are ‘locally exercised’ there are often so many restrictions, guidelines and ‘conditions’ imposed on ring-fenced grants that in reality the choices are limited and we do not have as much freedom to do what local people want as we should like.

These powers should be returned to local authorities and then devolved to the lowest appropriate level”.

Helyn Clack welcomed the debate and said that she would be delighted to see the undemocratic centralisation of powers reversed, particularly with regard to planning matters. Her strongest criticisms were reserved for the latest of Labour’s quangos - the Independent Planning Commission (which is unelected yet will make decisions on major planning issues such as the proposed expansion of Heathrow Airport and any future proposals for Gatwick Airport): “people expect local councillors to take decisions affecting their local area and be accountable to their residents, and even when matters are of a national importance (like Heathrow and Gatwick) there should still be a presumption of local decision-making. The current system is undemocratic”.

Tony Rooth added that he would be pleased to see an end to ‘ring-fencing’ which can be divisive and aims to force Government policies on local authorities and said that since people identified with their local communities it was right that powers should be exercised at the lowest possible level.

“Local people want greater control over the size, shape and "look and feel " of their communities. Conservatives will give them that choice. Lib Dems are not ‘local’ democrats by voting against giving local people a greater say and ignoring the opposition of over 2500 and 8 local councils to massive ‘exemplar’ development at Dunsfold. The Surrey Advertiser was right to headline - our “ Landscape not safe with the Lib Dems” ”.

All Conservative members present voted for the motion and in favour of localism.

The Lib-Dems, on the other hand, spoke with forked tongues. Rather like the Council Tax increase they said they supported the principle but then voted against it without giving particularly convincing reasons as to why. Bizarrely some of their Members said that they would be voting against the motion despite not having read the document that was being debated!

The only Labour party member present also voted against the motion.