The Local Government Association has agreed to give a “back seat” to directly lobbying for devolution after the government changed its policy priorities, with one senior Tory declaring the former devolution process pretty well dead .
The government’s scrapping of plans for a devolution white paper this year – and subsuming this work into a broader levelling up white paper – “suggests an opportunity to review the board’s work and how it might most effectively influence this new agenda”, according to a paper to yesterday s LGA people and places board meeting.
LGA officers “suggest a change in approach for our lobbying work”, which would “showcase local government’s ability to deliver effectively and at pace and to make a real difference in people’s lives, building on councils’ remarkable efforts during the pandemic”, the paper said.
Shock as well-known sector figures lose their seats
County Councils Network members are reeling from news that their chair David Williams (Con) has been ousted from his Hertfordshire CC seat by just 41 votes, meaning he also lost his national chairmanship.
Elsewhere, other longstanding local government figures from both main parties have also been unseated or face leadership challenges locally.
Although the Conservatives secured a majority of 14 in Hertfordshire, their leader Cllr Williams, who has been CCN chair since 2019, was narrowly beaten by Liberal Democrat candidate Paul de Kort in his seat of Harpenden North East by 2,063 votes to 2,022.
CCN’s executive committee will now work with the Conservatives, which remain the network s largest political group, to put in place an interim leader ahead of an internal election. A new chairman elect will be formally confirmed in September.
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