The wrangling over how services will be delivered in the area are continuing amid a new row about the potential postponement of the May elections.
Lincolnshire County Council has written to central government to say it would prefer two unitary authorities are created in the county.
Currently in this area there’s what’s known as a ‘two tier’ system with South Holland District Council overseeing more local issues like bin collections, housing and planning while the county council deals with roads, education and social services.
Central government is arguing having one council take on all services will save money.
It’s something South Holland District Council prepared for by creating the South and East Lincolnshire Local Partnership with Boston and East Lindsey councils.
For the past four years, all three have shared more staff and policies. It looks set to apply to be a new authority which will carry out the combined work of the current ‘two tier’ authorities in the area.
Lincolnshire County Council leader Martin Hill has now written to deputy prime minister Angela Raynor suggesting two unitary authorities are created to cover the county, and both North East and North Lincolnshire council areas.
That could be good news for the South and East Lincolnshire Local Partnership.
However, the combined population the new authorities cover would be less than the 500,000 figure which the government wants the new unitary authorities to cover.
The partnership itself covers about 330,000.
Encouraging South Kesteven District Council to join the partnership would seem to make sense geographically, but its leader Ashley Baxter has entered discussions to become unitary authority with Rutland County Council.
Coun Baxter listed South Holland as one of the authorities he’d spoken to about a merger, but said Rutland would be the preference.
“It makes a lot more sense than South Kesteven being paired with East Lindsey because Skegness is miles away,” he told the Local Democracy Reporting team. “They’ve got a different set of problems – valid problems – but problems I can’t do anything about.
“The same way I wouldn’t expect someone from Grimsby to explain to me how to run South Kesteven.”
To complicate matters further, there’s due to be elections to Lincolnshire County Council in May.
Given that there might not be such an authority in a year or two, many have questioned whether it would be a waste of money to hold them.
Some councils have already asked central government to postpone elections, and there were reports, but then subsequently a denial, that Lincolnshire County Council was one of those.
LCC leader Hill’s letter states he and the North Lincolnshire councils are “open to deferring the elections in 2025”.
South Holland Independent county council members Rob Gibson, Jane King and Manzur Hasan released a statement on Friday which said they ‘deplore LCC leader Martin Hill for requesting a postponement of May’s elections’ and that it illustrated the ‘contempt they hold for the voting public’.
The statement continues:
“To pull the election at this point only goes to show they are afraid of losing their seats, and rightfully so in our opinion.
“The excuses we are hearing are to save money or because it won’t be for a full term, our answer is codswallop!
“The mayoral election will still go ahead in the whole of Lincolnshire so that won’t save a penny, we then must sort Local government organisation before the next election, that means it will be a bare minimum of three years, probably four years, also known as a full term.”
Separate to the creation of the unitary authorities, a Greater Lincolnshire board is due to be created and led by a mayor due to be elected in May. Others on it would be some of the leaders of the councils likely to be discontinued.
