11 January 2002
The LGIU-managed Commission on Local Governance has invited interested parties to submit responses during the white paper's consultation period, before a panel of experts submits a report to the Department for Transport, Local Government and the Regions in June.
LGIU director Dennis Reed said the aim of the commission was to produce a 'powerful' and 'challenging' report that would force the DTLR to alter further the balance between local and central governance – something many authorities believed was overlooked in December's white paper.
He added: 'It is of enormous public importance that councils set out their stall to the government for changes to the white paper to enable councils to improve their communities and achieve genuine success for local citizens across the board.'
The commission's report is not expected to challenge fundamentally the DTLR's plans to introduce league tables for councils – a key focus of the paper – but many of the commission's panel believe it could effect other important changes.
In particular, the LGIU believes the review could lead to a clarification of the role of councils in the overall constitutional balance and increase pressure to introduce additional marginal tax-raising powers for local authorities.
Reed added that the initial government response to the commission had been positive and that the DTLR had indicated that it may be flexible on certain issues.
But a DTLR spokesman was more reticent, saying merely the department 'welcomed the LGIU's active debate'.
New Local Government Network executive director John Williams, meanwhile, has re-stated that while many local authorities gave the DTLR's proposals a tentative thumbs-up, 'there were still key concerns across the sector on how to deliver the local government modernisation agenda effectively'.
Williams revealed that a key focus for the network in 2002 would be a finance review that would also assess the potential for new marginal tax-raising powers for councils.
PFjan2002
