Originally posted @ 9:14 pm, Sat 29th Jan 2011
A pointless referendum is comig Nottingham's way.
I know, I know. Regular readers of this column - well, my Mum (I know, I should phone more) - the regular reader of this blog will be saying, but "Mike you support AV". And so I do. And if the change needs a referendum, welll then, I'd ask for it to be on a separate day from the local elections, so each event had its own due consideration, and I'd ask for the referendum to be done by postal balllot. For those parts of the country who don't have elections this year, the closure of schools to be used as polling stations on this referendum will seem a bit inconvenient.
The Localism Bill will require Nottingham to hold a referendum on whether we want a directly elected mayor, when in the last few weeks, all leaders of Nottingham's main political parties have said we want to go back to the committee system.
What a waste of time and money.
The irony of all the emphasis on localism is that it's creating more must do or elses for councils from national gov't. You must set a 0% council tax increase, otherwise we'll assume the money was as if you've set a 0% council tax. You must publish all invoices above GBP500 or else. (Even though national gov't level will be GBP25,000.)
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