Devolution and partnership causes confusion in Shropshire
The leader of Reform UK in Shropshire says there is confusion regarding devolution and the partnership work the council is doing.
Councillor Dawn Husemann is the chair of a partnership working task and finish and group that has been looking at enhancing collaboration between Shropshire Council and strategic partners, in particular town and parish councils. However, she said confusion has arisen regarding the partnership and devolution, which will involve town and parish councils taking on services from the unitary authority.
“Unfortunately, they’ve become conflated in the public’s and the parish councils’ minds, and I’m very concerned this is going to undermine the very important work we’re going to be doing on partnership, like how we’re going to work with the NHS, the fire service, police and voluntary sector,” said Councillor Husemann.
She has therefore asked the Transformation and Improvement Overview and Scrutiny Committee to separate the two.
“We had agreed to look at a review within six months of how the devolution process has gone,” said Councillor Husemann.
“That is going to be important, but I genuinely do not want to undermine the very important work we we are going to be doing with partnerships.
“We’ve got to deal with this confusion in people’s minds. Devolution is not partnership. We need to investigate, analyse and learn from the process, but having it tied with the actual partnership is causing issues, and could cause bigger issues going forward.”
Councillor Heather Kidd, leader of Shropshire Council, said the term, “devolution” is really confusing.
“There are two sorts of devolution going on at the moment. It may be that we have a different word for it. Devolution just means ‘handing things down’, but actually the Government is using it to ‘hand things up’. There are all sorts of issues around that when it comes to regionalisation.
“Handing powers down to towns and parishes is quite an important thing. Some parishes even want to buy new signs for their villages without having to go through the council. It’s enabling them to do the things they want to be able to do.”
Councillor David Minnery, who was chairing the meeting, said he would write to both members and the Shropshire Association of Local Councils (SALC) to explain that, while both are “really important pillars of what we do”, they are not the same.
“We shouldn’t be getting the same task and finish group to be doing both,” he said.
