So, in 2024, we’re discussing serious local government reform. There’s a new White Paper out.
Lots of comments and discussions on this on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/posts/antlerboy_innovation-leadership-socialcare-activity-7274712857965998082-dG1t
The Devolution White Paper
It’s a rational, forward-looking document that cites innovation and leadership, that seems to be the culmination of Treasury’s century-long campaign to ‘make local government make sense’ (to it), and is laser-focused on removing planning obstructions as ‘barriers to growth’. There are some good ideas, and some ideas that seem like good ideas.
If you’ve ever read ‘Seeing Like A State’, it’s the perfect example of the authorities clearing away the rich dense thick forests and planting ‘normalbaum’, standardised trees at standardised distances in rows that are easy to assess for quantity of wood for taxation.
And Conway’s Law reads thus:
“Any organization that designs a system… will inevitably produce a design whose structure is a copy of the organization’s communication structure.”
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There are many good arguments to be had about efficiency, representation, mayors, subsidiarity, trust. But now is not the time to have them.
Because councils, and the good folk within them, are barely holding on; without quiet bailouts and frantic work behind the scenes, dozens would have declared insolvency already. Those with social care responsibilities are focused only on them and the associated finances. Districts and Boroughs are doing really interesting actual place-based work. The broken NHS, supposedly spared from another shake-up, is currently working hard to align with current structures. All at a time when energy and resources are already stretched to breaking point.
What’s needed is breathing room, recovery time, life support and rehabilitation. Not for the real local costs — political, financial, human — to be swept under the rug, as if disruption itself were a strategy. And then, a gentle rewilding, to listen to the call of relational public services, for adaptive services that truly meet local needs.
Who truly benefits from these neat, standardised patterns imposed on messy, human places? If we keep designing power structures that assume local priorities are a nuisance to be removed, then what exactly are we empowering?
And still, it seems nobody is focused the real costs of all this: money, political capital, and, above all, time and energy that might have gone on more urgent, basics-first fixes. This isn’t rearranging deckchairs, it’s replacing all the hull panels on the Titanic.
I’m ready — not with despair, not with hope, but with determination — to roll up my sleeves with those who make it through, to make it work, to bring out the best, to adapt. I’m a consultant — and consultants will do well from this.
But it could be otherwise — we could be having an appreciative conversation based on understanding local government and helping it to meet the needs of local people.
Some links
Here is the White Paper itself https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/english-devolution-white-paper-power-and-partnership-foundations-for-growth/english-devolution-white-paper
And factual, on-the-day response from the LGA https://www.linkedin.com/posts/local-government-association_our-factual-on-the-day-briefing-on-the-devolution-activity-7274519646404308993-Z_B1
Possibly the best response so far from Adam Lent (did not expect that moving from New Local to The King’s Fund would liberate and embolden him!) https://www.linkedin.com/posts/adam-lent-5b461a196_councils-to-be-merged-in-major-overhaul-of-activity-7274463453044518912-6ByM BUT what I said to him in the comments there is:
if we’re going to make a difference in this critical thing at this critical time, our instincts to be rebels, critics, activists… it’s just not going to work, is it?
How can we find a way to *help* Treasury, the Government to achieve *their* agenda, while trying to help them see what we see?
I think that Jonathan Werran at Localis has absolutely nailed the analysis to be honest: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jonathanwerran_localis-response-to-english-devolution-white-activity-7274476085063438336-byGK
And a clear and expected response from the District Councils Network https://www.linkedin.com/posts/district-councils-network_the-english-devolution-white-paper-proposes-activity-7274465346948849664-oz_B
There’s a thriving debate on Blooski, more perhaps about coverage of this (little to none in the main press) than the overall implications, though that’s all there https://bsky.app/profile/samfr.bsky.social/post/3ldgx32k7522x (I have to say I usually 100% agree with Sam Freedman, I’m surprised he seems to be off-based on this one — though there are always the odd, Gove-ite areas where I do disagree with him)
Oh, and by the way, the Chancellor is also forcing government departments to put their spending plans past a panel of private sector folks (including a senior leader from — I snorted coffee through my nose — the Co-operative Bank). Hellooo — the 90s called, they want their Star Chamber back! https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/dec/09/rachel-reeves-spending-plans-private-sector-experts
Interesting contributions from Dom Campbell too — looking at the contents of the White Paper on its own terms https://www.linkedin.com/posts/dominiccampbell_english-devolution-white-paper-activity-7274469538287480832-44wd
One little weirdness that has been bugging me for ages: councillors (at all levels, often all at once) used to be the backbone of all the major parliamentary parties, subsidising as well as energising and staffing local political structures. I can’t quite work out why that link no longer seems to hold, or matter… in Labour, it’s probably because Constituency Parties came to be seen as a major threat during the Momentum era, when newly-minted Corbynstans roamed the AGMs with their app telling them who to unselect, part of the long-term Labour centralist fear of entryism.
So the centralising instinct to keep out ‘the hard left’ ends with the power in the party completely isolated from councillors (but many of them are ex-councillors?) and no real connection to local government… I feel this is important, overlooked, and only part-way there.
Well, more to come…
Lots of comments and discussions on this on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/posts/antlerboy_innovation-leadership-socialcare-activity-7274712857965998082-dG1t
