Cornish Social & Economic Research Group
» What CoSERG Thinks » Press releases » Voting rights sacrificed and democracy shrunk
Plans for a unitary Cornish council seem designed to produce two things; First, the centralisation of local government on a small core of councillors and officers in Truro; Second, fewer elections. In future the Cornish electorate will only meaningfully get the chance to pass judgement on their representatives once every four votes – a pathetic voting frequency compared to most western democracies, or even with communities in urban parts of Britain.
As a sop to those calling for a Cornish Assembly the Liberal Democrat leadership at County Hall and its Westminster MPs held out the prospect of devolution of powers from the current unelected regional quangos. As CoSERG has pointed out there was never any concrete promise of devolution or special treatment for Cornwall in any communication from central government. On the contrary, these have consistently treated Cornwall as merely another local government area, identical to Wiltshire, Cumbria, Durham and the rest.
Now the Lib Dems have succeeded in their plan to trigger a unitary authority we should surely be seeing a flurry of activity, lobbying central government and leading a public campaign to press for the devolved powers we were assured the unitary authority would herald; Strange then that to our knowledge there has been no such activity.
Moreover, Lib Dem councillors have been unable even to agree on the small symbolic step of supporting a Cornish language name for the new authority. If they cannot even take this step what hope is there of this timid party leading any substantial campaign for real regional powers for the new authority? On its past record we have to reluctantly conclude none. Could it be that voting rights in Cornwall have been sacrificed and democracy shrunk for no visible return?
For the arguments against the unitary authority on democratic grounds read our One County Less Democracy