CAMPAIGN: Somerset Residents REJECT Unitary Authorities AGAIN

 

Lib Dem, Labour, Green or Tory
SAME OLD STORY

 

Despite our country being in a Covid-19 Crisis throughout 2020, elected Lib Dem and Tory councillors in Somerset have been trying to sneak through changes to how YOU are governed and how YOUR money is spent. They've done it using money that could be spent on Covid recovery.

And now we know that what Somerset Independents told these councillors:

• the timing is wrong, 
• the idea is wrong, 
• residents don't support it

- was absolutely correct. 

Because the people have spoken in two separate surveys, paid for by taxpayers because councillors spent your money to prove what residents already knew. Yes, really.

In one survey, 71% of 2,046 residents surveyed as a representative sample of Somerset adults said that they did not support the Stronger Somerset proposal of two more unitary authorities, as proposed by South Somerset, Somerset West and Taunton, Sedgemoor and Mendip district councils. 

And 86% of residents surveyed said they did not support the One Somerset proposal of one unitary authority for all of Somerset. The Somerset county boundary excludes North Somerset and the parts of Somerset in the Bath and North East Somerset unitary authority areas. So it would not have led to "one" Somerset, but three. Anyway...

The question was already a biased question, asking them what restructure they would choose. So this is the best that they could manage.

In 2007, a postal poll of residents resulted in about the same result - 82% saying no to a unitary authority.

SO NOTHING HAS CHANGED SINCE 2007 AND THEIR PROPOSALS ARE A WASTE OF MONEY DURING A NATIONAL CRISIS!

Instead of getting their priorities right, and listening to residents, the councillors of the national parties have been spending YOUR money on a futile exercise to re-organise our councils.

This is why we were calling for a Referendum of ALL Somerset residents, because YOU should have your say.

But councillors carried on spending your money on this futile and offensive exercise.

Somerset resident Alan Guest, who has lived in Somerset since 1988 and worked for the County council from 1996 to 2010, told us:

"It's all well scripted self promotion and no substance or as they say where I come from originally, it's all fur coat and no knickers! They keep pumping out the same old same old, in the mistaken belief that if they keep telling us over and over we will eventually take it as the truth."

Mr Guest's view is echoed by the over 158,000 people who voted against a unitary in 2007, and also by those who responded to these new surveys.

The survey results completely justify our questioning of the decisions and the money spent.

Yet Somerset's councillors carried on, despite that 2007 postal poll of Somerset residents which showed - again, that 82% of residents DID NOT WANT a unitary authority. The poll was conducted by independent body Electoral Reform Services, and jointly paid for by the five district councils back then.

Roll forward to 2020, and councillors used more public money to produce a report, the FoLGIS (Future of Local Government in Somerset) report. Which councillors and council officers under instruction of councillors then worked to discredit and undermine, variously describing it as wrong and discredited. The report included a very balanced piece of work by academics at De Montfort University. But that work was shoved into the Appendix. De Monfort's work showed that these types of amalgamations don't work - not in the UK, not in Europe and not across the world.

But the Tory councillors on Somerset County Council didn't listen to the experts. And they did not listen to the residents. 

Instead, Tory councillors spent even more taxpayers money on their "One Somerset" proposal for a single unitary authority to replace all four district councils and the county council. They even voted to STOP YOU HAVING YOUR VOTE IN MAY 2021 IN THE COUNTY COUNCIL ELECTIONS! And to award themselves more allowances for a longer period!

After this, the Liberal Democrats and Tories on the four district councils spent yet more taxpayers money on a "Stronger Somerset" proposal for two unitary authorities to replace them.

Then all these councils spent even more money, in a battle and competition on which proposal was best. All to try and please dodgy MP and Minister for Local Government Robert Jenrick - who was last year caught up in a corruption scandal relating to property deals and planning permission. Councillors claimed that it would be him making the decision, not residents.

Councillors then used public money to pay PR people to try to sell their stupid ideas, using misleading information, with Stronger Somerset falsely making claims that Professors support their ideas, (we have it in writing that Stronger Somerset never contacted the authors of the aricle - see * below) and using dodgy statistics that do not represent the full facts.

How much money have they wasted on this futile exercise? The public need to know.

The councils could have joined together, or they could have stopped this madness during a National Emergency, but they used public money to argue amongst themselves.

And most importantly, they did not bother to ask you whether they should have started this futile process in the first place. They just went ahead.

In our campaign for a Referendum, Somerset Independents contacted ALL district councillors and county councillors. Some on several occasions.

We spoke at council meetings to ask them to back a Referendum.

We were campaigning for a Referendum very loudly and very consistently.

But the vast majority of Liberal Democrat, Conservative, Labour and Green councillors DID NOT LISTEN!

The vast majority DID NOT EVEN RESPOND TO OUR COMMUNICATIONS! They thought that they knew better than the people of Somerset.

And now, the people have spoken again AGAINST unitary changes. TWICE!

TWO REPRESENTATIVE POLLS OF A REPRESENTATIVE SAMPLE OF SOMERSET RESIDENTS SHOW THAT THE VAST MAJORITY OF SOMERSET RESIDENTS DO NOT SUPPORT UNITARY CHANGES AND/OR THAT  THEY HAVE NOT EVEN HEARD OF THE PROPOSALS!

An Ipsos Mori poll was conducted and paid for with YOUR money by the Lib Dem and Tory district councillors, and supported by Labour and Green councillors too. 

Another poll was conducted by the Tory councillors on the County Council. It showed that the vast majority of people had not heard of their proposal.

The report on the poll said:

"Three in four Somerset residents (76%) are indifferent to who delivers their local services, as long as these are delivered to a high standard • However, most want more information about the One Somerset proposal (73%) and don’t necessarily trust local Councillors or politicians to make the right decision about the future of Somerset on their behalf. (p4)"

These polls were paid for by taxpayers' money.

All this public money has been spent, during a Global Pandemic and National Crisis!

It could have been better spent on helping businesses to survive, to protect people from Covid-19 and to provide higher morale and hope for the future.

Instead, Lib Dems, Labour, Green or Tory, the same old story.

Spending YOUR money to protect themselves and their parties.

And to these national political parties, Somerset's local communities, Somerset's local people, local businesses, local areas and local families are way down the list of priorities. 

THESE NATIONAL PARTY COUNCILLORS SHOULD ASK THEMSELVES WHETHER THEY REPRESENT YOU?

WE KNOW THAT THEY DON'T!

Ask them why they did this, when Somerset residents had already told them that they didn't want it.

Vote them out when the time comes!

Vote for Somerset Independents councillors who listen to you, and act for local residents - not political masters in Westminster. 

And join us in our campaigns to stand up for residents and work with residents.

Standing Up For Somerset Residents

 

* Colin Copus, Emeritus Professor of Local Politics, who supports our campaign for a Referendum, rebuffed the Stronger Somerset PR people's claims. He told us in response to Stronger Somerset attempting to use his paper to justify their proposal:

"‘I, or my co-authors, Steve Leach and Alistair Jones, haven’t been contacted by Stronger Somerset. But to set the record straight, our evidence shows there is no need to merge or create bigger councils in Somerset or anywhere else for that matter. We certainly do not show that new unitary councils – of any size - are necessary but that the two-tier system has strengths and benefits that should not be lost by creating unitaries, of any size’."