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5

Buckden Roundabout

August 2019

From Your Councillors

FROM YOUR DISTRICT COUNCILLOR

Once again our Village Fete provided a super focus for the

summer and many thanks to all those who worked so hard,

especially Philip and his family, on getting this organised. Also

to Compere Chris, who kept events moving all day!

And once again we are at the same point in the year when

funding for County, District and Local Councils and organisa-

tions is a serious issue. County Councillors are openly talking

of how long they can survive, given increasing responsibilities

and flat funding. Huntingdon District Council is in better shape

than most, thanks to the Conservative Majority’s long-term

plans to successfully increase revenue generating activities.

The County Council is considering doing the same thing, with

proposals to convert Shire Hall into a large hotel for the Cam-

bridge tourist trade.

Here in Buckden, the Roundabout remains our key concern. A

western by-pass remains the correct strategic way forward

and recent new legislation has infrastructure funding includ-

ed. To get this by-pass back onto the Parliamentary agenda,

the A1 Safety Groups in Buckden and Sandy are joining forces

to launch a Petition to Parliament to request that the A1 be-

tween Alconbury and Baldock is brought up to national stand-

ards.

Jonathan Djanogly, our MP will be supporting this with addi-

tional support in Parliament and mobilising all the A1 MP’s. I

have been working hard on developing an inclusive Public

Relations campaign to get all major transport organisations

and fleet operators using the A1 involved and hopefully get

their individual members to support us. Launch is planned for

end of August, so more news soon.

Hamish Masson

Councillor HDC Buckden Ward

(

Hamish.Masson@Huntingdonshire.gov.uk

)

FROM YOUR COUNTY COUNCILLOR

County councils were created at the end of the 19

th

century.

Their main purpose was to coordinate many of the public ser-

vices on which people rely for their day-to-day lives, for exam-

ple: education, social services, highways, fire and rescue, waste

disposal, libraries, consumer services, town and country plan-

ning.

They were funded on a mixture of direct taxation (the local

council tax), business rates and central government grant

(essentially the national government paying local authorities to

carry out tasks they thought important but which they could

not administer directly from London).

Obviously the detailed structures have changed over time and

some readers will remember the reforms of 1974 which creat-

ed larger county council areas. More recently, in some areas

county and district councils have been reorganised to form

‘unitary authorities’.

Some functions have been removed from county councils: they

used to run colleges of further education and the careers ser-

vice but no longer; in 2010 schools were given the freedom to

opt out of what was called ‘local authority control’ and become

free-standing academies. Many did so, mainly secondary

schools, since when they have re-grouped themselves into

Academy Trusts, mini-councils but without any democratic

oversight.

Why this history lesson? Because we are now on the brink of

another significant change in the role of the county council.

There has been a great deal in the national media recently

about county councils going bankrupt, or soon to be unable to

meet the rising demand and cost of providing the basic ser-

vices people have come to expect.

Many of you have been asking me what the future holds. We

may well be at another turning point. In the last decade of aus-

terity since the financial crash of 2008, the money available to

county councils has not simply kept pace with the demands on

the services.

The Local Government Association (LGA), which brings togeth-

er councillors from all political parties, has been outspoken in

its challenge to government:

‘The quality of the places we live in depends on our councils.

They are the central cog in a machine that brings together all

the elements we need to feel secure, safe and fulfilled. In turn,

our councils must have the support from government to enable

them to get on with the job.

This is no longer about councils having to prove they can do

more for less – it is now the Government’s turn to show it has

listened, understood and cares enough about the millions of

people that rely on council services to take action.

Although collapse and bankruptcy are not imminent in Cam-

bridgeshire, the reduction in services is huge and likely to get

worse over the next couple of years. Some of cutbacks seem to

me to be very short-sighted. For example, reducing Children’s

Centres which provide vital early care to families in difficulty

may save money now but is likely to exacerbate social and hu-

man problems later on, with increased costs to society. Remov-

ing financial support from voluntary bodies is a particularly bad

idea because, if we lose the goodwill and generous contribu-

tion of volunteers, the elderly, vulnerable, and disabled will

suffer.

Cambridgeshire, short of money from the traditional sources, is

merging its services with other local councils, becoming a prop-

erty developer, setting up a lottery and its Leader has even

been on a visit to China to try to persuade Chinese businesses

to invest in Cambridgeshire!

All this is a far cry from the original intention and purpose of

the county council system. It may be that new structures will

emerge but my fear is that it is the most deprived members of

society, the infirm elderly, the vulnerable young children who

will suffer most. That is a challenge to us all!

Peter Downes, July 2019