Hyndburn to be axed. - Page 47

garinda · 09-11-2007, 00:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by claytonender

He says he is not bothered whether the name is changed or not - I was waiting for a bolt of lightening to strike him dead. But unfortunatly there was no divine intervention.

It seems an awfully bad use of time management, if that is true.

g jones · 09-11-2007, 08:35

The referendum will be in Feb or May (dependeing on cost) and will be one question. Its a turn around as Labour Councillors were told a referendum for the name change was too expensive only 3 weeks ago. This new policy announcement was released via the newspapers again without much discussion at the Council.

Q. Do you want your district to have a Town or Parish Council administered by Accrington and Districts Council?

I believe the renaming issue is in chaos. This new policy is to mask that and again is policy on the hoof.

My comments in the Ob were slightly distorted. We have looked at the issue of Town and Parish Councils and there are too many problems as Willow & Claytonender point out.

We have have had a County Council delegation to discuss the structures and powers, as well as Parish & Town Councillors form Burnley & Ribble Valley give their views. PB has had little of this and jumped the gun. Labour Councillors are slightly split against the idea at the last discussion we had on the matter.

It's a new tier of bureaucaracy. A lot of services can't be divided. Where they can Borough will be the contractor and Town or Parish the customer creating unnecessary paperwork. Important economic decisions about employment sites etc.. become hugely problematic and what about logos and stationery etc.. Running the bureaucracy will cost £50-£100 extra in Council Tax (which has happened in Altham already) eventually and may not provide much more in terms of services. Then the cost of the democratic process is high. These are just a few issues.

There are some advantages but it's hard to look beyond the bang for buck argument of costing too much for too little.

WillowTheWhisp · 09-11-2007, 09:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by g jones

Q. Do you want your district to have a Town or Parish Council administered by Accrington and Districts Council?

Very badly worded question.

There are two subjects under discussion here - one the district and parish councils and the other the name change of the whole borough.

The above question only seems to give the options of two answers:

a) Yes, I do want my town/parish to have it's own council administered by Accrington and Districts Council.

b) No, I do not want my town/parish to have it's own council administered by Accrington and Districts Council.

Where is the chance to say "I do not want the Borough council name to be changed as it's a total waste of time money and effort" ?

This palaver seems to be becoming potentially more and more expensive as it goes on - is PB still insisting that it won't add a penny to the council tax?

lancsdave · 09-11-2007, 10:01

Would it not be cheaper to rent a deserted island for 50 years and let PB live there. It would achieve his ultimate aim of ruling the land

Gayle · 09-11-2007, 10:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by g jones

Q. Do you want your district to have a Town or Parish Council administered by Accrington and Districts Council?

That's an incredibly leading question. It's really a two parter so to say yes to one part implies agreement to the other. Some people may agree to wanting a Town Council but not to the overall name change - how are you supposed to vote?

My gut feeling is that I don't like the idea of Town Councils but until we've heard all arguments I will not make a final judgement.

However, I have a lot of questions:-
Will there be elected members of a Town Council? Will they be the same Councillors as sit on the Borough Council and will they then sit on both Town Council and Borough Council? Will members be co-opted from different sectors of the community? Will elected members be Party (i.e. Labour/Conservative/Lib Dem) representatives or will they have to remain independent? What will the costs of setting the Council's up be? Will there be additional costs to the tax payer each year for the priviledge?

claytonender · 09-11-2007, 10:20

[quote=g jones;491204]Q. Do you want your district to have a Town or Parish Council administered by Accrington and Districts Council?[quote=g jones;491204]

WillowTheWhisp · 09-11-2007, 10:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gayle

That's an incredibly leading question. It's really a two parter so to say yes to one part implies agreement to the other. Some people may agree to wanting a Town Council but not to the overall name change - how are you supposed to vote?

That's what I thought Gayle. It's already making the assumption that the Borough name will change.

garinda · 09-11-2007, 10:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by g jones

The referendum will be in Feb or May (dependeing on cost) and will be one question. Its a turn around as Labour Councillors were told a referendum for the name change was too expensive only 3 weeks ago. This new policy announcement was released via the newspapers again without much discussion at the Council.

Q. Do you want your district to have a Town or Parish Council administered by Accrington and Districts Council?

I believe the renaming issue is in chaos. This new policy is to mask that and again is policy on the hoof.

My comments in the Ob were slightly distorted. We have looked at the issue of Town and Parish Councils and there are too many problems as Willow & Claytonender point out.

We have have had a County Council delegation to discuss the structures and powers, as well as Parish & Town Councillors form Burnley & Ribble Valley give their views. PB has had little of this and jumped the gun. Labour Councillors are slightly split against the idea at the last discussion we had on the matter.

It's a new tier of bureaucaracy. A lot of services can't be divided. Where they can Borough will be the contractor and Town or Parish the customer creating unnecessary paperwork. Important economic decisions about employment sites etc.. become hugely problematic and what about logos and stationery etc.. Running the bureaucracy will cost £50-£100 extra in Council Tax (which has happened in Altham already) eventually and may not provide much more in terms of services. Then the cost of the democratic process is high. These are just a few issues.

There are some advantages but it's hard to look beyond the bang for buck argument of costing too much for too little.

I take it that the structure of these councils would remain as is? With a Chairman and up to nine co-optees, all unelected by the general public? Or would these individuals be elected by us at democratically held elections, as the old urban town councils used to be?

This urgently needs clarification, because if the people on the councils are unelected, and in charge of such important things as financial budgets, I can foresee chaos. Also the new 'independent' councils could be hijacked, and taken over by one particular group and their cronies, and run as Quangos, which is a very frightening thought indeed.

As for the wording of the referendum question, pathetic!

If Britcliffe doesn't care one way or the other, as he reportedly said recently, this seems like he's desperately clutching at straws, and using the parish councils issue to bulldoze the name change through.

The two things are, and should remain, two separate issues.

WillowTheWhisp · 09-11-2007, 10:31

To the cynic in me this idea of the individual councils seems to have been brought up to overshadow the silly nonsense of the name change. People assumed the name change was going to actually mean going back to the 30 year old status quo ........ could it possibly be that the individual parish/town council idea has been plonked on top of the name change just to lead them into the false assumption that they were right?

It isn't going to be like it was in the olden days. I've said that all along. Even with the additional individual town councils we will still have the borough council be it Hyndburn or Accringtonanddistricts by name. There is absolutely no way this is not going to be more expensive.

Oh and while we're at it. If Accringtonanddistricts borough is the main body and if Church, Ossy, Clayton etc get their own individual councils will Accrington itself also have an individual council? Or will there be one town in the borough that is controlled only from the borough council?

It just doesn't seem to have been thought through.

claytonender · 09-11-2007, 10:34

Gayle has posed some very pertinent questions here, regarding the set up of Town Councils. Whilst bringing the democratic process nearer to the the people is a laudable idea, we need a full explanation of how our lives as residents of Hyndburn will be made better by having them.

Last night PB said he was going to use Great Harwood as a pilot scheme,however we DO NO NEED a pilot, as there is already in exsisitance within the borough a Parich Council in Altham. Altham Parish council has been in exsistnace for many years, but it is only in the current finanacial year (2007 to 2008) that the council tax payers, who reside within the 'Parish' of Altham have had an extra precept on their Council Tax bill to pay for its administration etc. Unfortunately, as I don't live within the boundaries of the Parish of Altham I haven't got the figures for this cost.

garinda · 09-11-2007, 10:36

Not being too much of a scaremonger, but if these new town/parish councils are run by people unelected at the polling booths, what is to stop us from seeing all Muslim, or all one party, or all idiot, run town councils?

WillowTheWhisp · 09-11-2007, 11:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by garinda

Not being too much of a scaremonger, but if these new town/parish councils are run by people unelected at the polling booths, what is to stop us from seeing all Muslim, or all one party, or all idiot, run town councils?

Or - 'all in the pocket of one meglomaniac' town councils?

claytonender · 09-11-2007, 11:38

Someone from Great Harwood, raised a very interesting point at last night's meeting about the proposed name cahnge to 'Accrington and Districts'.

Thye wanted to know whther the all idea behind the name change was so that we could amalgamate with Blackburn and then the local authority would become 'Blackburn with Darwen and Accrington Borough Council'.
Peter denied this was the purpose but made some remark that we might be forced by government legislation (in the future) to combine into a larger authority.

MargaretR · 09-11-2007, 12:00

I never voted and had not made my mind up UNTIL NOW
Recent developments have made it clear to me that -
NO CHANGE WHATSOEVER is the way to go

Ianto.W. · 09-11-2007, 12:33

Further to my suggestion that 'our Peter' take over as MP for 'Hyndburn'. Devine inspiration informed me that he would make a good replacement for Pope of Accrington, gedditt.