On Saturday, Labour’s local government conference saw a gathering of Labour councillors from across the country, many of whom were justifiably angry about the savage government cuts to local government and looking for Labour’s alternative vision. As councillors we are in the position of making some really tough decisions that none of us dreamt we would be voting through. With the prospect of a Labour government in May, many are looking for a fairer deal.
That vision appears to be coming from our peers across the country who are coming up with the innovative solutions and tackling some big social issues facing our communities. Such as Haringey with their schools commission, fair energy scheme in Oldham and Nottingham council’s employer hub.
It is clear that it is not about the money. We have to realise that there will not be extra money for local government. But, we cannot allow the cuts to define us. There are Labour councils using this opportunity to redefine how they work to focus successfully on outcomes.
This work was acknowledged by warm words from Ed Miliband. He gave a solid, crowd pleasing speech talking about clamping down on tax avoidance, rewarding the hard work of all by providing decent jobs at decent wages and giving young people better life chances by expanding vocational education and apprenticeships. All good stuff. He also made the very welcome announcement that he is ‘totally serious’ about the devolution agenda and will ensure fairer funding settlements for local areas, ending the cruel Tory agenda of cutting the most from poorer Labour areas.
We still await more on what will be devolved to local government and how councils can be freed up to deliver public services in the future. There is nothing yet about whole place budgeting, working as one with partners and importantly financial devolution, which could bring massive economic benefits. We need to be having the conversation about reforming council tax, setting local levels and being able to do things like raising money on the bond market.
In order for these conversations to be fruitful we need to have a culture change at both levels of the party. Councils need to be taken seriously and we need to show more forcefully that we have the solutions. Local councils also need to change their culture to ensure they are fully ready to take on new powers and, crucially, be prepared to give those powers away to local communities. The worst outcome from devolving power to councils would be for it to just sit in town halls.
So the message to Ed is to really look at what councils are doing, trust your colleagues in local government and trust the local people who use public services to help shape them.
The message to local authorities is to continue being innovative, really think about what will help your area and stop those things that do not have an impact: be open to challenge, from your communities and from your peers. With power comes great responsibility and we need to be held fully accountable.
We now have a great opportunity to get this right. Lets use this to reshape local government to benefit us all.
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Kiran Ramchandani is a councillor in the London borough of Harrow
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