An examination of the issues, lack of reform and international comparisons are out of the way. So it’s time to get to the “meat” of local government and look in more detail at options for reform or, indeed, keeping things as they are.
Some of you will be waiting for the money stuff and the politics (i.e. number of councillors), but I’ve decided to look these separately:
Starting at the bottom and working upwards, here’s what could happen at community level – currently the responsibility of town & community councils (where they exist).
The potential options here are varied, though it’s rare for a nation to not have some form of community-level local governance.
Community meetings can already be held at the town & community council level and there are clauses in Welsh law around holding community meetings in certain circumstances. There’s nothing to say you can’t have them alongside some form of elected/representative body (i.e. annual budgets for town & community councils could be approved by a community meeting). Although I’m a fan of direct democracy, it’s something worth piloting before attempting to introduce it as standard (just to see if it works).
Community associations would play to the high esteem charitable organisations are held in by parts of Welsh civic society – and they would be a resurrection of Communities First. However, if there’s a lack of proper scrutiny and accountability there’s the potential for abuse and fraud. It should be discounted as a form of community governance in my opinion, though there’s no reason why town & community councils couldn’t be given powers or rights such as the first refusal over community assets.
Town & community councils are the status quo and would likely be the most popular option amongst community councillors themselves. As units of local government, they’re small enough to have a genuine attachment to a particular community or neighbourhood. Reform and rationalisation might be the best way forward here rather than outright abolition: fewer town & community councils, proportional voting and some additional place-based powers. That’s a realistic and practical option and Barry Town Council perhaps presents one of the best examples in Wales of how that might look in terms of staffing requirements and the kind of services that can be delivered.
Area committees “kill two birds with one stone” but risk coming across as a bit technocratic and distant from communities – almost like a unitary authority takeover of community councils. It may save time and money – and means we would only elect a single set of councillors every few years – but what might work in a large-ish city like Cardiff, where all the main players are a short distance away from each other, might not necessarily be right for rural areas. It’s certainly practical but far from ideal. Perhaps the three city & county councils (Cardiff, Swansea, Newport) should be allowed to do it, but only them.
My personal preference would be a Danish-style municipality system led by directly-elected mayors/co-mayors (using the “primary settlement model” from the map – so around 53 municipalities). This would cut the overall number of community councillors and councils whilst elevating their role and responsibilities. It allows more functions (including regulatory functions, like licensing) to be delegated down to the community level, leaving the “big ticket” people-based services (i.e. social services, education) to be managed by fewer, larger county or regional councils. That in itself would be a major challenge to overhaul and rebalance local government that Wales has already flunked multiple times.
As for counties and regional councils – guess what’s coming up next week?
