Former Nottinghamshire County Council leader Ben Bradley says there’s ‘Opportunities and risks’ in Government plans to merge councils
Political leaders past and present are divided over the Government’s plans to merge local Nottinghamshire councils in an attempt to cut costs and make services more efficient.
The Labour Government’s English Devolution White Paper outlines its support of giving powers back to local areas through the creation of more “strategic authorities”, as has been done in the East Midlands with the creation of the new combined authority and a mayor.
But it also outlines hopes for creating new combined councils, instead of two-tier structures like that in Nottinghamshire, to reduce the overall number of councillors and slash costs amid significant financial pressures across local Government.
In Nottinghamshire one tier of council services including roads, schools and social care is provided by Nottinghamshire County Council. But a second tier of seven smaller, separate district and borough councils provides other services like parks and bin collections.
In the city the council system is different. Nottingham City Council is a unitary authority, meaning it is responsible for all services in its boundaries, including bin collections, parks and adults and children’s social care.
“New unitary councils must be the right size to achieve efficiencies, improve capacity and withstand financial shocks,” the paper says.
“For most areas this will mean creating councils with a population of 500,000 or more.
“Unitary councils can lead to better outcomes for residents, save significant money which can be reinvested in public services, and improve accountability with fewer politicians who are more able to focus on delivering for residents.”
It is not the first time the possibility of council unification has been discussed in Nottinghamshire.
Kay Cutts, the former Conservative leader of Nottinghamshire County Council from 2017 to 2021, had previously put forward a business case for replacing the current two-tier system of local government in the county with one larger authority — or ‘super council’.
She had said the current system for local government was unsustainable, and suggested pooling services into a singular council to save an estimated £30m a year.
The seven district and borough councils, and the county council, all have elected councillors, senior management teams, chief executives and back office functions, which come with costs to taxpayers.
However the plans were shelved in 2018 due to political unease about them.
Speaking on the Government’s plans outlined in the White Paper, she told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “I would support the proposals, as long as we kept parish councils.
“It was an idea that my group had in 2018 and we put these forward for adoption. There is a very good reason for it.
“At the moment we have seven second secretariats. Every two years we have elections, between county and the boroughs and districts, and those are quite expensive.
“I cannot see the point of that. You could then sell all of the headquarters to bring in capital receipts.”
However Ms Cutts raised concerns over any merger of borough councils with Nottingham City Council, which declared itself effectively bankrupt last year.
“We would not want the city to take over the boroughs,” she said. “Broxtowe, Gedling, I don’t think would want to be in the city.”
Nottingham city, the wider county, Derby city and Derbyshire, are now part of the East Midlands Combined County Authority, which was created as part of a devolution deal to give local areas more power to spend money where they know best.
The authority is headed by Labour Mayor Claire Ward, who in a May election defeated former leader of Nottinghamshire County Council, Ben Bradley, who had stood for the Conservatives.
Mr Bradley, who also lost his Mansfield MP seat to Labour’s Steve Yemm following a party landslide victory in July nationally, will be stepping down as a councillor in the upcoming elections next year.
Instead he is now working as a devolution and local government consultant to help businesses and other organisations adapt to the new structures.
Speaking to Notts TV, he said the White Paper’s suggestions come with both “opportunities and risks”.
“There are chances to improve services, there are significant efficiencies in that, efficiencies of scale and reducing duplication,” he said.
“Examples like district councils that have to decide where housing is built, but the county council has to deliver the roads, buses and schools and they don’t necessarily talk to each other properly.
“So doing that all in one place could deliver a much better service, but the risk is of course that is a big and resource intensive change over a number of years that could be disruptive and critics will argue perhaps it is a little bit less local.”
Not all political figures in the county are supportive, as was the case back in 2018.
Jason Zadrozny, the leader of the Ashfield Independents-controlled Ashfield District Council, told Notts TV: “I think it is pretty deplorable. It is not what anybody thought when they were voting for the last government.
“We do things well and we’ve invested in services so that Ashfield residents get the best. Now they shouldn’t be pooled up and lose all those services to support failing councils.
“There is no way it can work for my residents.”
Leader of Broxtowe Borough Council, Milan Radulovic, said while he is not opposed to local government reorganisation, he is opposed to the way in which it is being done.
“Putting decisions in the hands of fewer people puts you nearer to a dictatorship,” he said, arguing the Government is seemingly being run by Labour leader Keir Starmer’s ‘starmtroopers’.
“It is always top-down.
“Find me a reorganisation that has ever saved us money. Privatisation has never saved us money. It will make things more expensive.”
Nottingham City Council’s leader, Neghat Khan, said while she welcomes the plans, the council is currently working to “understanding the options for Nottingham, working closely with our neighbours and partners”.
