THE County Council proposal for a ‘Super Council’ is an attack on local democracy.
It will, if anything, cost money. It will deliver worse services to the people of Oxfordshire. It is a blatant attempt by a Tory county council to scrap Oxford City, the only Labour-run authority in Oxfordshire.
I sit on both Oxford City and Oxfordshire County Councils and they are like chalk and cheese. Oxford City is well-run and is making no cuts in staff or public services. Oxfordshire County stumbles from crisis to crisis, getting rid of excellent staff and slashing essential services; from road repairs to children’s centres.
The County accounts for 80 per cent of council spending in Oxfordshire. So most savings should already be being made by the County.
The County Cabinet is at last talking about ‘business transformation’; better use of office space, computers and land. But it is too little and too late.
In practice, councils are at their best when we co-operate together. Together the City and County, for example, have boosted recycling, begun to clean-up Oxford’s air and made the Plain roundabout safer for cyclists.
As councillors we need to get on with it, not wait for re-organisation. The answer to the problems of local government is not to move the deckchairs. We need to receive back more of the money everyone pays in taxes to the Government. Local people should run local affairs. Hands off Oxford City and hands off the other district councils in Oxfordshire.
Cllr JOHN TANNER
(Labour) Littlemore ward and Isis division
City Council Board Member for a Clean and Green Oxford
Sunningwell Road, Oxford
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