February 09, 2006
I smell a rat. Do you smell a rat? There's definitely something ratty in the air.
Let me get this straight. There are rumours of plans to suspend local democracy in England during 2007 so that us cash cows don’t have to be bothered to vote for local representatives who might end up representing us for only one year. Only one year because New Labour is planning a significant shake up in local democracy by, they hope, some time in that very same year. Hmmmm…..
The New Labour Minister for Communities, Mr Miliband, has this to say about the shake up and the discussions they are having with our locally elected representatives:
"The debate on local government reorganisation is gathering pace - we are having a mature discussion with local government - and we will make our position clear in the Local Government White Paper in the middle of this year."Now the thing I want to get straight about this is that there is a chance that New Labour will fail to meet their deadline for the passing of their new law. There is a good chance that if we were given the opportunity to vote, as we have done for donkey’s years, on who our local representatives are New Labour would come out in a weaker position than they are now. Perhaps this local shift will change the tone of this mature conversation that Milband says he is having with our local chiefs. Perhaps this change in tone will reflect the feelings of the scruffy voters?
My spider senses are tingling. Tingling because I would not put it past New Labour to end up suspending the local elections until after a delayed new law has been passed using some excuse like they were going to be suspended anyway due to the restructuring they were expecting to happen and that it is only a few more weeks or months for us voters to wait.
The picture I have painted above has got to be wrong hasn’t it? It’s got to be.
