A referendum to gauge Lincolnshire residents’ appetite for scrapping eight councils in favour of a unitary approach to local government in the county has been shelved.
County council leader Martin Hill announced last month that it was his intention to ask for councillors’ support for the poll to be held on May 4. He said the move would remove residents’ confusion over which tier of council deals with which services and could save £30million a year in its first five years.
But leaders of some of the district councils involved railed against the plan, with lack of consultation being cited.
Lincoln City Council rejected the idea outright but South Holland District Council leader Gary Porter said it would have accepted the poll under certain conditions, particularly given the possibility of legal challenge.
He said: “South Holland was quite happy for them to do it providing they pay the cost and indemnify our returning officer.
“Although Anna [Graves, SHDC chief executive and returning officer] would technically have been working for the county council that day, I didn’t want her left being exposed.”
He added: “My [Conservative ruling] group’s position would be not to start the unitary conversation but if someone else puts up a proposal then it would be to include not just Martin’s bit [Lincolnshire County Council and seven district councils] but North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire councils too.
“We would then favour three unitaries – one in the north, one in the south and one in the middle, all of about 330,000 residents.”
In that scenario, South Holland District Council would likely amalgamate with South Kesteven District Council and Boston Borough Council.
Meanwhile, Coun Hill says he’ll be pushing for consultation with residents on whether they support in principle the idea of moving to a unitary system.
He said he was disappointed that a referendum could not have been held in May at the same time as residents would be voting in county council elections.
“The idea was to keep administrative costs to a minimum – and to encourage a high turnout – by holding the two things together,” he said. “Unfortunately, it won’t now be possible to hold a poll on May 4, which is deeply disappointing.
“For various reasons, some of the county’s seven district councils – the bodies responsible for conducting the elections – are not prepared to co-operate. Although I don’t personally agree with their legal and other objections, the county council can’t require them to help with the holding of a poll.
“Instead, the county council will be discussing at its meeting on February 24 whether to find out your views in a different way. This could take the form of some kind of consultation – perhaps through County News, this website and other means – later in the year.”
Coun Hill maintained that the move “could be a really good thing for local services in the county” but it wasn’t about what he or any other councillor at county or district level thought, it was about residents.
