Local government reorganisation decisions: CCN responds

Today the government has announced its decisions for local government reorganisation in Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk and Hampshire - and will consult further in East and West Sussex.

The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government Steve Reed today said that ministers will implement five unitaries in Essex and Hampshire, and three in Norfolk and Suffolk.

However, the government also announced it had not made a decision in East and West Sussex and will consult further in both counties, including a 'modified proposal' put forward by ministers.

Below, the County Councils Network responds.

Simon Edwards, Chief Executive of the County Councils Network, said:

“At the start of the reorganisation process the government set out very clear criteria, outlining that new councils should have a population of 500,000 or more and to avoid the unnecessary fragmentation of care services.

“County councils put forward evidence-based proposals that comprehensively met those tests, with each one commanding a great deal of support from residents, business and public sector partners and underpinned by robust and deliverable implementation plans.

“Despite this, the government have chosen to implement proposals that are clearly at odds with their own criteria. Some 12 of the 15* proposed unitary authorities are substantially below the 500,000 population threshold, while we now face the prospect of widespread disaggregation of care services and unprecedented levels of complex boundary changes to create small, under-bounded city based unitary councils.

“At a time when council finances in two-tier areas have never been more under strain following the Fair Funding Review, the evidence clearly shows that these ministerial decisions will inevitably end up costing local taxpayers more while causing greater upheaval to services for the most vulnerable. These areas will now need to consider the implications of today’s decisions, and we will support the county councils in their next steps in responding to these announcements.

“The CCN will be seeking further information to justify the basis of the decisions arrived at today and the implications for evaluating proposals submitted by the 14 remaining areas, including the unprecedented decision from government to not proceed with any local proposal in Sussex and put forward their own top-down plan.

“County councils have engaged positively and in good faith with this mandated programme of reorganisation, developing proposals in line with the statutory criteria they were meant to have been tested against. But with the government choosing to divert from this, our member councils will now rightly raise serious questions over the process that has been taken, the basis of today’s decisions and the motivation that lay behind them.”

• Excludes Isle of Wight