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Unitary Devon - High Court will rule in the New Year

Tuesday 23 December

EAST DEVON District Council’s lawyers will spend Christmas awaiting a High Court ruling on the Boundary Committee’s proposal to reorganise local government in Devon.

EDDC maintains that the Boundary Committee was using out-dated financial data when it came to its view that a giant single unitary council was a better option for the future than the current system. One of the key factors any new system must satisfy is that that it is affordable – that is to say it will save money even after the expense of bringing about the change.

The Council also believes the Boundary Committee did not share the financial information with the public in a way that was accessible and easy to understand, with the result that people have not had an opportunity to look at it critically.

Critical

Finally, EDDC contends that the Boundary Committee was wrong to decide that it could consider only one possible outcome, so dismissing out of hand any other possible arrangements.

EDDC Leader Councillor Sara Randall Johnson commented: “We want the court to help us ensure that the Boundary Committee looks at these issues properly. The Credit Crunch has moved things on in a very short time from where they were when the Boundary Committee first started looking at the figures. Affordability is even more critical now than it was then, so it’s vital that they base their decision on the most up-to-date financial information.

 “The Boundary Committee has a public responsibility to assess affordability in the light of current national and international financial market conditions, and to make use of all the financial information in its possession. The Boundary Committee’s draft proposal was based on 2007/08 estimates, when 2008/09 budgets were available, as well as the audited figures for 2007/08”.

Prudence

Miss Randall Johnson added that Council Tax payers would expect that those advising on the financial aspects of local government review would approach their task with the same prudence required of accountants carrying out due diligence exercises in company mergers or reconstructions, since the decisions will impact on their long term financial well-being, much like shareholders in companies.

She concluded: “The economic downturn has had a significant impact on both the financial reserves available to Devon authorities and to income, both of which are crucial to working out whether any model of reorganisation meets the Secretary of State’s test for affordability. We believe the people of East Devon can expect these matters to be properly and seriously addressed. We could take little satisfaction in telling the Government ‘we told you so’ if the Boundary Committee’s sums prove sadly wrong’.

Mr Justice Cranston will give his decision early in the New Year.

Note to Editors:

EDDC’s lawyers were in London on Friday 19 December to ask the court to quash the Boundary Committee’s current process and require them to carry it out properly. The case had been given an urgent hearing because of its public importance.

The Council’s legal team were also seeking a declaration that there is insufficient time before the close of representations to the Boundary Committee on 24 December on affordability for lawful consultation to be properly completed, and/or that the Boundary Committee should not report to the Secretary of State on any proposal for Devon until it has conducted and considered the responses to a lawful consultation exercise.

EDDC maintains that the Boundary Committee consultation process on reorganisation was flawed, amongst other things, because the issue of affordability had not been translated into a meaningful format on which the public could comment. The Boundary Committee instead published hundreds of pages of financial data on their website.

East Devon was also concerned that the Boundary Committee appears to have misdirected itself in law in concluding that it could only put forward one multiple unitary authority pattern of local government for Devon as an alternative to a single unitary, thereby restricting the range  of draft proposals open to it.  In the event, only one draft proposal, for a single Devon unitary, was put out to public consultation in July this year.

The EDDC hearing followed the earlier decision of the High Court on the legal challenge by Norfolk’s Breckland Council to the Boundary Committee, after which the Secretary of State decided to extend until 13 February 2009 the deadline for the Boundary Committee to report to her with any proposal for reorganisation. The date was previously 31 December 2008. The Breckland challenge also resulted in the Secretary of State issuing the Boundary Committee with further guidance on how it should carry out its role.

Anyone wishing to comment on the proposals can still do so by writing to Max Caller, Chairman of the Boundary Committee at: www.electoralcommission.org.uk/boundary-reviews

Or email Hazel Blears, Secretary of State at the DCLG, at: blearsh@parliament.uk

You can also fill in the online petition against a Unitary Devon at: http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/devonstatusquo/#detail

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