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Welsh Assembly ‘not planning to merge councils’
Friday 2nd September 2011, 12:45PM BST.
The Welsh Assembly building in Cardiff Bay, Cardiff
The Welsh Assembly has denied it is planning to merge councils “by the back door” after revealing a blueprint for radical reform of local government.
It wants six new regional groups to run services such as education and social care, rather than the 22 local authorities. The move would see Powys County Council run certain services with other authorities.
The plans propose a Mid and West region, with a population of 519,000 from Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, Powys and Pembrokeshire.
John Evans, Powys County Council spokesman, said today that many services were already run jointly with Ceredigion County Council.
There are no plans for a cut in Wales’s 1,264 councillors under the Assembly’s proposal.
Although councils will not be merged, ministers will insist they look to deliver services jointly within these six areas.
Local Government Minister Carl Sargeant has told the cabinet the current collaborations were “pick and mix” with different councils working together on different policy areas.
The new boundaries are designed to match Local Health Board borders and police areas, to make it easier for services to be integrated with them.
Liberal Democrat local government spokesman Peter Black said he was in favour of cutting the number of councils, but accused the Assembly of reorganisation ‘by the back door’.
He said: “This is a blueprint for reorganisation.
“I’m OK about having that debate, but let’s have that debate, not ease our way there surreptitiously.
“Let’s actually have a debate about what we want to do with local government.”
The Assembly wants to introduce a law aimed at forcing councils who are reluctant to share services to do so.
A spokesman for the Welsh Local Government Association, which represents councils, said the plans would be discussed at its meeting later this month.
By Andrew Morris
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it makes sense for councils to share more back office functions, so long as there is still local councillors, local contact points and control over service standards – who cares where the admin HQ is frankly?
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