Councillors are due to receive an update on plans to create a new mayor of Sussex and a shake up of councils across the wider area.
Brighton and Hove City Council’s Place Overview and Scrutiny Committee is expected to hear more about the proposed changes at a meeting on Thursday (5 June).
Next month, the government is due to announce its decision on whether to progress with devolution for Sussex and Brighton and Hove and to publish the results of a public consultation which closed last month.
The consultation asked for people’s views on setting up a “mayoral combined authority” with two representatives each from Brighton and Hove City Council, East Sussex County Council and West Sussex County Council.
In the consultation, comments were sought on the geography, governance and the effects on the environment, economy and services.
A report to the Place Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting included a timetable for the “devolution priority programme”.
An English devolution bill is due to be introduced before Parliament’s summer recess, or break, and eight weeks of parliamentary debate is due to take place in the autumn.
Once the bill becomes law, the first meetings for the new mayoral strategic authority are expected early next year, with representatives of the three top-tier councils in Sussex due to agree a constitution and appoint officers.
Mayoral elections would take place in May next year. Three Conservatives have announced their intention to become their party’s candidate.
They are the Sussex police and crime commissioner Katy Bourne, the former East Worthing and Shoreham MP Tim Loughton and West Sussex County Council leader Paul Marshall.
For Labour, former Brighton and Hove City Council leader Daniel Yates, who has also served on Adur District Council, is seeking the nomination.
Once operational, the mayoral strategic authority will take responsibility for
- transport and local infrastructure
- skills and employment support
- housing and strategic planning
- economic development and regeneration
- the environment and climate change
- health, wellbeing and public service reform
- public safety
The mayoral authority would receive funding to cover these operations and a 30-year investment fund as part of the devolution process.
he next phase, also up for discussion next week, is local government reorganisation which would reconfigure areas under a two-tier system of district and county councils.
Brighton and Hove is currently the only unitary authority in Sussex, delivering more than 700 services.
In its interim plan for local government reorganisation, the council said: “We believe that our current council size is broadly set up appropriately for Brighton and Hove and we do not feel the need to pursue local government organisation arbitrarily.
“Notwithstanding this, we recognise that there would be benefit in reorganisation if it supports greater efficiency, effectiveness and resilience for the city and we are open to change where the evidence and data support this.
“We are keen to explore options that will help us address the critical challenges facing our city, such as homelessness, housing affordability and inequality.”
In a three-week consultation in late February and early March, suggestions included bringing the eastern half of Saltdean into Brighton and Hove from the Lewes district.
Other possibilities included expanding Brighton and Hove to include Southwick and Shoreham to the west and Peacehaven to the east.
These proposals affect East and West Sussex where there are two tiers – county councils and district councils. Some districts are known as boroughs, although they have exactly the same role.
In March, Brighton and Hove City Council submitted its draft plan, proposing five unitary authorities across Sussex. The council would either keep its current size and shape or grow and become one of the new councils.
Brighton and Hove City Council’s draft proposals would mean five unitary councils, representing between 300,000 and 400,000 people.
Councils are due to submit their final proposal by Thursday 25 September.
The report to the committee quoted the government setting out its aims: “In the English devolution white paper, we outlined a population size of 500,000 or more.
“This is a guiding principle, not a hard target – we understand that there should be flexibility, especially given our ambition to build out devolution and take account of housing growth, alongside local government reorganisation.
“The criteria ask that consideration should be given to the impacts for crucial services such as social care, children’s services, SEND and homelessness, and for wider public services including for public safety.”
The Place Overview and Scrutiny Committee is due to meet at 4pm next Thursday (5 June) at Hove Town Hall. The meeting is scheduled to be webcast.
We, in East Saltdean, don’t want anything to do with Brighton. Our bins get collected every week, we don’t want to lose millions on an I360 and none of our rates are used to rebuild terraces that we never see or sort out the coast road in Brighton both of which their council hasn’t bothered to maintain for years.
No one voted for this. It will take decision making further away from the places which will be affected. Labour will pay a price for their dictatorial arrogance and for undermining local democracy. And worse, they’ll probably give another mayoralty to Reform as the hapless Tories flounder and help Farage in to No 10 – a disaster in the making. All Labour had to do here and in Westminster was govern fairly, openly and democratically.
On the other hand, it will bring powers from Parliament, closer and more local. The devil is going to be in the details.
In particular the predicted cost of this rearrangement.
How can this be when no local council elections have been held? I don’t agree to any of these proposals as I feel that we are being ram‐rodded into believing they will be good for Adur & Worthing residents. The only people to benefit will be those in East Sussex. We need to vote then we will see what’s really what.
I smell several rats. Local politics should be local
So you are in favour of devolution.
This isn’t good for several reasons, firstly we didn’t get to vote on it. Secondly, and the biggest concern, I live in an rural area of West Sussex, where peoples needs and problems are way different from urban East Sussex.
We do not need another layer of government! Urban Brighton is quite distinct from parts if rural Sussex!