Worthing & Adur Councils merger & spending cuts – public consultation.

[The Doctor]

So, having combined many services to save money, Worthing & Adur Councils are going to ask the public and businesses what they think about a full merger of the two councils.

The consultation will also look for suggestions as to where best savings can be made in the budgets to cover the public spending cuts we all knew were coming.

From Worthing & Adur Councils:

Adur and Worthing residents and businesses will be asked to take the role of ‘chancellor’ and contribute to the budget debate in the two areas.

Residents will be asked for ideas on reducing budgets and increasing income in a leaflet which will be delivered with the annual register of electors form In September. The leaflet sets out how the budget is currently allocated and gives people an opportunity to say what they think is most important to them and what is not. The public will also be asked if they would support a full merger of Adur and Worthing councils.

The two councils are faced with making cuts of nearly half a million in Adur and almost £1million in Worthing in this financial year. Further cuts of £2 million and £3.2 million, respectively, could be made by the end of 2013/14.

Following the example of the coalition government a cross party budgetary advisory group has been set up for in each council. They have been tasked with reviewing the budgets, considering the shape of local government for the future and considering more ways to work in partnership.

Leader of Adur District Council, Neil Parkin said:

"We are being totally open about this. Before cuts are made we want to know what our residents think are the most important services to them. And if anyone has some suggestions how we could make money we want to hear from them.

"Everything is up for grabs and we are questioning everything we do. And we want to know if the public would support a full merger of the two councils, if this would mean substantial savings can be made."

Leader of Worthing Borough Council, Paul Yallop said:

"There’s no doubt that we have difficult times ahead and it is important we involve local people so that when we have to make those tough decisions we have a good idea of what is matters to them.

"I would like to reassure people that the new swimming pool in Worthing is going ahead. This is because the pool is a one off capital project which will provide income and reduce the costs of running a pool for years to come. We are not pulling the plug on this one."

[treehugger]

Didn't we have a vote on this before?

Seems as there's loads of confusion between which council provides what services I like the idea of a single council, so we know exactly who to blame for the mess.

[seasidegeek]

I've never understood the point of having a two tier council system, seems much more logical to have just one to me.

[treehugger]

Didn't we have a vote on this before?

Doc?

[spider]

Didn't we have a vote on this before?

I thought that, but nothing coming up in search.

[The Doctor]

Doc?

I thought that, but nothing coming up in search.

Sorry for the delay in replying, I've been seriously busy on 'real life' stuff connected in particular with the Floating Fish Beer & Music Festival, the backend of the site and other stuff.

You're right, there was an earlier thread and I moved it to a hidden area on the site to avoid confusion whilst I tried to work out how to merge them, but because they both have different poll options I can't see how to do it.

However, the pervious thread was only asking a simple yes/no as to if they should become a unitary authority separate from the county council, whereas that doesn't seem to be what is being asked, it seems the suggestion is that Worthing & Adur could merge but remain under West Sussex County Council, so the poll options on this thread are better.

So, I've closed the other thread, which can still be viewed via this link, so avoid further confusion and allow this new and slightly different discussion to continue.

[treehugger]

Sorry for the delay in replying, I've been seriously busy on 'real life' stuff connected in particular with the Floating Fish Beer & Music Festival, the backend of the site and other stuff.

Not good enough.

[The Doctor]

There's a article on this specialist site for people working in the planning sector that includes a piece about Adur & Worthing Councils working together.

The process has gone furthest at West Sussex neighbours Adur District Council and Worthing Borough Council. Both are small, largely urban Conservative-controlled coastal authorities. An outright merger would have been a legal minefield.

Instead, the pair have merged what they can while remaining separate legal entities. They share a chief executive, senior management and most service teams.

Merger focuses on common strategies

As well as meshing together their core strategies as far as possible, Adur and Worthing have carried out joint flood risk and housing market assessments. Only the political leaderships remain separate. The councils will continue to have their own planning committees.

The main impact on jobs has been at the top, where the two heads of planning left when the councils merged all senior posts.

"We've joined up our planning policy teams but are still working on two core strategies that are at different stages," explains James Appleton, executive head of planning, regeneration and well-being for the two councils. "We have just submitted the one for Worthing and expect to consult on Adur's later in the year. We will also join up development control later in the year."

Appleton says: "We are an area with 160,000 people in all. Although we still have two planning committees, there are councils smaller than us that have more than one committee. Having separate committees might mean that people initially keep working on their patch, but as staff change there will be less of that. We are looking at the best way to organise geographically to cover the whole area."

Development control faces a recruitment freeze and has lost some agency and temporary jobs, but Appleton hopes that the workload will be sufficient to maintain staffing numbers. "The big savings have come from senior jobs across both councils. They have gone down from 23 to 12 senior managers and there have been large savings on accommodation and supplier costs," he explains.

Planning Resource

[Freddie Ferret]

I hear the council leaders are saying this is unlikely to go ahead as it has little public support.