Councils in East Sussex hold debts of almost £600 million
The Labour Government is involved in an exercise akin to – rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic when the ship is sinking. It is an organisational reshuffle without reform – structural changes that don’t tackle underlying issues. We needed reform of local government finance not fiddling around with local government boundaries.
Councils in East Sussex hold debts of almost £600 million reports the Argus and the BBC.
It’s like an episode from the BBC’s Yes Minister, but it doesn’t just waste the time in the Ministry of Administrative Affairs – it is wasting time up and down the country of all of the councils and thousands of councillors.
What is worse is that government ministers didn’t review the cost of the reorganisation. In a recent BBC report it is revealed that the Government did not do its own analysis of the cost of the biggest reorganisation of councils in England for decades!
What is needed is the reform of local government finance. For years local councils have had to put the begging bowl out to the Government on numerous ‘single issues’ from potholes to social care to name just two. There is no government strategy for financing local authorities and Angela Rayner’s (Deputy Prime Minister) local government reorganisation, misguidedly called ‘devolution’ isn’t going to improve the situation. It’s the cart before the horse. There needs to be a strategy for local government finance rather than reorganising council areas on a map!
For years the Government has ignored the underlying issue – they have been reactive – moving from financial crisis to financial crisis while services get worse.
I believe it’s not too late to cancel this reorganisation and stop the car crash.
The image used at the head of this article is free to copy. See: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Prime_Minister_Keir_Starmer_hosts_first_Cabinet.jpg
Vic Ient 
