Peter Kent-Baguley

Curiously, this is apparently the title of an article penned for the Public Servant Magazine by our friend, professor Michael Clarke, chairman of the controversial, government imposed Stoke-on-Trent Governance Commission which published its report last autumn. The question seems totally irrelevant to the narrative which is a brief self-congratulatory outline of the Commission's evidence gathering and its 14 recommendations.

Irritatingly, Clarke repeats his mantra about "the seemingly broken politics of the city" and the "apparent fractures in the city's political system." For an academic, seemingly and apparently so confident that he, and what he describes as "a distinguished group of colleagues", successfully comprehended the complexities of the city's political processes that enabled them to pronounce solutions, it does seem unnecessarily modest of him to resort to seemingly and apparent! 

There are two enormously obvious and glaring gaps in Clarke's report. An absence of any description, let alone, analysis of what is and what might be the role of councillors. Secondly, an abject failure to address the government designed structural destruction of the democratic political structures and processes in the city. The Local Government Act 2000 introduced the Executive system and thus stripped councillors of 90% of their decision-making role. This was accentuated here with the peculiar, unique and grossly undemocratic Council Manager and Elected Mayor system, where practically ALL authority resides with the UNELECTED Council Manager/Chief Executive.

Is it really, therefore, a surprise that fractures have appeared within the city council's political system? Is it really a surprise that this has led to serious disenchantment amongst large sections of the electorate? Is it really a surprise that the traditionally dominant Labout party has shrunk to the depths of having to seek succour and support from the Tories and Lib Dems to muster a majority of one? Is really a surprise, then, that the voters have turned away from the main political parties and increasingly voted for Independents of some ilk or another and also increasingly for the BNP?

And if all that were not enough, is it really a surprise that people have got disenchanted with the cobbled coalition clumsily discharging the diktats of government against the wishes of local people? 

Local Government minister Hazel Blears and the rest of her Cabinet colleagues would do well to pause and reflect on their rhetoric about giving power to the people. He most recent White Paper about local government is called: Real People, Real Power. What hypocrisy!

The Governance Report's 14th recommendation was the establishment of a Transition Board to facilitate the introduction of the recommendations. He concludes his article by saying that the 13-member government appointed Board, chaired by Clarke himself, "met for the first time on 11th November to receive a report on the council's action plan and its first stages of implementation." Really, that's news to me! I shall be seeking an immediate clarification from the Council Manager since councillors have been told no such plan has yet been submitted.