Note the way that I phrased that. I was a bit concerned that the Western Mail headline generated an image of electors clubbing Councillors to death as they emerged from a darkened Council chamber. Not something anybody would want to encourage especially in these fraught times for politicians.
More seriously though the former Leader of Bridgend Council and local government consultant, Jeff Jones has suggested that we have twice as many Councillors as we actually need. He has proposed changing the Councillor-voter ratio from one for every 2,300 or so electors to one for every 4,527 voters. This would have the effect of cutting the total number of Councillors in Wales from 1,264 to 653.
To consider the impact of this we need to understand what a Councillor does. Their role is not just about running a council, indeed in these times of Council Cabinets the actual decisions are now taken by no more than a handful of Councillors in each authority and the workload of full Council and committees has changed as a result.
All Councillors have a pastoral role and a role as community leaders. That can both be quite time-consuming and very fulfilling if it is done properly. Non-Executive Councillors also have a scrutiny role. It is their job to keep the executive in check and to facilitate a process of continuous improvement in their authority through effective policy reviews and by asking awkward questions. One of the reasons this is becoming more difficult is the growth in the number of partnerships and arms-length companies that by-and-large defy proper scrutiny.
There are also other roles for Councillors in determining planning and licensing applications and passing Council wide policy such as the Local Development Plan, Children and Young People’s strategy, Local Housing Strategy and many more. The full Council also determines the budget and council tax levels each year. Councillors represent their authority on outside bodies including local schools, universities, colleges, racial equality councils, fire authorities, police authorities, community centre management committees and many more.
It is not a full time job being a backbench or opposition Councillor and no doubt there is scope to revisit the numbers. However, Welsh Liberal Democrats would be opposed to this happening in isolation. Jeff Jones mentions Scotland where this process has already taken place. It did so as part of a reorganisation of local Councils and the introduction of fair voting.
We are not advocating a wholescale Council reorganisation either as this would be hugely disruptive and open to abuse, however we can see a place for a review of partnership working between Councils that puts in place more effective joint working and which introduces fair voting whilst at the same time looks at the total number of Councillors. We would prefer this to be led by local government itself. I am also personally open to considering a small reduction in the number of local councils to achieve better economies of scale.
This should not be about saving money but about effective democracy and representation. To approach any democratic reform on the basis of cost alone will devalue the process of governance and undermine the role of voters. Let us have an effective democracy not a cheap one.
Peter Black is the Welsh Liberal Democrats Local Government Spokesperson
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The danger of reducing councillor numbers too much is that there will not be a large enough talent base from which to draw the council leadership.
This has been the major failing* of the Welsh Assembly, and one which accepting Richards in full would rectify.
*Most noticeable in the majority party, of course.
Before 1995 we had 500 county councillors and 1400 district councillors.Today we have 1200 in total. However there are more councillors dealing with education, social services and highways than there were then. Is it purely coincidence that children’s services in Swansea and education in Denbighshire have failed?
To overcome Frank’s point there is a strong case for directly elected Cabinet members.
Let us remember from where this proposal comes. It requires a substantial political organisation to win a seat of 5000 electors. It makes it much more difficult for the smaller political parties to gain a seat.