Labour are set to enable stealth tax hikes for millions of voters while denying them a vote in next year’s council elections.
Angela Rayner’s ‘devolution revolution’ will create more directly elected Mayors, who will have the powers to impose a ‘Mayoral Precept’ on top of council tax, for large parts of England.
Her reforms, which will see ‘strategic authorities’ covering areas with a population of at least 1.5million replacing two-tiered councils, may also force authorities to delay elections organised for May 2025.
The Deputy Prime Minister said England will go from one of the ‘most centralised’ nations to one where local leaders ‘with skin in the game’ have significant powers.
This will include an attempt to give everyone a directly elected Mayor instead of the current hybrid system, where there are County and District Councils which handle different duties, as well as Unitary Authorities.
Existing combined authority mayors already levy a precept on top of council taxes in Manchester, Liverpool and Cambridgeshire.
Ms Rayner has already signed off on the creation of mayors in Greater Lincolnshire and the combined authority of Hull and East Yorkshire, which are set to be elected next year.
Hampshire, Sussex, Kent, Essex and Cheshire are thought to be next to bid to have a Mayor.
Angela Rayner ’s ‘devolution revolution’ will create more directly elected Mayors, who will have the powers to impose a ‘Mayoral Precept’ in addition to council tax
The reforms may also force councils to delay elections organised for May 2025 as two-tier authorities are replaced with ‘strategic authorities’ (file image of a polling station)
Ms Rayner talked up new Mayoral powers, adding: ‘Mayors will be hard wired into the fabric of how we govern and will lead the way on house, building, transport skills, and more. Too often, mayors’ hands are tied by Whitehall, even when it comes to allocating their own budgets.
‘So we will create a clear and transparent route for all mayoral combined authorities to receive an integrated settlement. This means moving resources between projects that matches what their people need.’
She also said ministers will be able to ‘knock heads together’ in areas which can’t agree on coming together.
The deputy Prime Minister added: ‘Devolution is a journey, and some will need time to decide the course they wish to follow, and we will give local leaders time and space to do this, but our ambition is clear. We want to fill the map with devolution.
‘Our manifesto pledged to give everyone access to devolved power.’
But she was accused of giving local people power with one hand while taking away democracy with the other after suggesting that authorities undergoing reorganisation could see their 2025 elections delayed.
All 21 county councils in England are currently up for election on May 1, as well as 10 unitary authorities.
Ms Rayner suggested central government would not interfere in the process, but that any decisions would be made from the ‘bottom up’. Officials are believed to be expecting a slurry of requests to postpone next year’s polling.
Earlier, Local Government Minister Jim McMahon told LBC: ‘This is an open invitation for councillors who want to be part of an early tranche of reorganisation and devolution to come forward.”
‘At the moment, the assumption is that elections are going ahead.
‘However, it’s usual in a process of reorganisation that when a council makes a request for reorganisation, that if there are elections taking place to a council that essentially won’t exist within the term of those elections, you hold off those elections and you elect to a shadow body.’
Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, said: ‘They will present this as saving money and being more efficient. But it seems very last-minute and are they running scared of the electorate? Clearly, they are terrified of Reform.’
Reform chairman Zia Yusuf added: ‘Starmer is governing like a despot’.
The Tories won 1,448 seats in 2021 at the height of Boris Johnson’s popularity, while Labour was reduced to 365 seats and the Liberal Democrats won 293. Sir Keir Starmer’s party have been performing particularly poorly in council by-elections since his government were elected in July.
There are additional concerns about the creation of ‘mega councils’ severing the link between local representatives and residents.
The Deputy PM (pictured in Leeds) said the Government wants to ‘fill the map with devolution’
Green Party co-leader Adrian Ramsay MP said: ‘Local democracy is in urgent need of reform but this White Paper does not deliver the real change our local councils need.
‘These plans risk moving power away from local councils to huge remote super councils and regional mayors.
‘Devolution must mean real decentralisation of powers and funding so local councils can deliver the improvements to services that their communities need.’
A District Councils Network spokesperson said: ‘We are concerned about the potential for reorganisation to be disruptive, hitting the delivery of local services, as has been the case in the past. It is likely to make it much harder for councils to focus on investing in and delivering the Government’s missions. That would be in nobody’s interests. ‘
Simon Kaye, policy director at think tank Reform, said: ‘There is also a risk that plans to abolish district councils will leave local neighbourhoods feeling even more neglected. The result of reforms cannot be simply the creation of ‘mini Whitehalls’ at a regional level – communities need a real say.’