LOCAL government in all its aspects has been discussed in the news quite a bit of late, ranging from serious discussions about resourcing and possible reorganisation, to some utterly ridiculous moments that make you wonder how some folk ever got through their respective parties’ vetting processes.
We’re used to Liberal Democrats making fantastical claims about themselves and others in their election leaflets.
However, it’s going to take a lot for them in future to surpass the situation in the recent Colinton/Fairmilehead by-election in Edinburgh: the party’s candidate, Louise Spence (below), spent her campaign bigging up her local credentials, and was elected – then quit less than a week later, after it emerged they were planning to go and live overseas.
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Still, they qualify for a long-service medal compared with the hapless Labour winner of the Glasgow North-East council by-election. They barely had enough time to shake hands with the chief executive and get a picture taken for their security badge before being automatically disqualified from office, after failing to quit their council job within the legally prescribed timeframe.
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You get the feeling that, however public-spirited these two were in standing for election, neither will be much of a loss to their respective City Chambers.
But spare a thought for the folk of Moray, currently being led – if that’s the word – by a minority Conservative group currently looking at how to navigate their way through setting the annual council budget. Having previously opened a consultation on the future of local libraries, they sought a bit of cheap publicity last week by proudly trumpeting that no libraries would close on their watch.
Humiliatingly, they were forced into a public U-turn just a matter of hours later, when it was pointed out to them that their own consultation had yet to report – and that even then, only the council as a whole would be able to take a decision on whether or not to abandon the closure proposals.
Admittedly, this is a small and unrepresentative sample. From my own experience of being a councillor, I can attest that there is no shortage of political talent right across Scottish local government, doing their best often for little return other than the satisfaction of serving their communities and (hopefully) a job well done.
Nevertheless, when women represent 52% of Scotland’s population but only make up 36% of Scotland’s councillors, while the 39% of our population aged over 55 make up 56% of our councillors, it’s hard to argue that we are managing to bring forward the best possible range of talent and experience to serve our communities.
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When significant sections of society are underrepresented by our democratic outcomes, it is sadly no surprise when their priorities and views also go underrepresented when key decisions are taken.
But what if the unrepresentative nature of local government is less of a people problem and more of a structure problem? Highland councillors recently debated whether residents there might be better served by having the area served by several smaller local authorities. In the end, councillors rejected the call, opting instead to do more to empower existing local councillor committees.
Those Highland discussions will have been grist to the mill for those who argue strongly for far smaller units of local government, citing the mostly hyper-local councils of Norway as an exemplar to follow when it comes to participation and accountability.
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And on the surface, a case can certainly be made that Norway enjoys far better outcomes and participation rates than we often see at home. But if Scotland’s single-tier councils are too big to be local and too small to be strategic, the Norwegians clearly wrestle with the same tension.
Those 357 small Norwegian municipalities still sit within a two-tier local government structure, with a further 15 counties (Fylker) further up the tree looking after matters such as secondary education and public transport. Both of those tiers also must work alongside a county governor appointed by the central government in Oslo to oversee all that they do.
England is about to go through a major upheaval too, with district councils being swept away in favour of larger single-tier councils of around 500,000 people, all to be crowbarred into a structure of “metro mayors”. We have some vocal fans of these mayors in Scotland, too. But if anyone really thinks that reducing local government to just one powerful elected voice in the hope it will be an aid to democracy and participation, or indeed actually get more things done better, then I have a bridge to sell you.
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Right now, local government in Scotland works across existing structures and boundaries, whether that’s in transport, strategic development, the scrutiny of local police and fire services or the governance of City Deals. It may not be perfect, but it’s what we have.
And so long as there remains little evidence that mergers, demergers or the sharing of services and staff either cuts costs or improves services, then it’s hard to argue convincingly for a radical re-drawing of the map.
When it comes to post-independence Scotland, I’d like to think it’s about much more than Scots taking power from Westminster, pooling what we need to with Brussels and then thinking that’s the job done.
Whether now or in the future, I quite like the idea of enshrining local government, with the Scottish Parliament itself reserving powers, while everything also not explicitly reserved then rests within the competence of local government.
That is something which I believe could be genuinely empowering for communities. However, more than that, perhaps the best thing we could all work towards across political parties is not redrawing council maps, but instead encouraging in all we do more active, engaged voters who are willing to get involved, and who are prepared to reward the improvers, the do-ers, the scrutineers and those who genuinely have their community at heart.
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