Clause 19 - Application to parish and community councils
Local Government Bill
2:45 pm
Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight, Conservative)
I am pleased to support my hon. Friend with regard to the burdens on parish councils. Like him I support the devolution of more responsibilities to parish councils, but it has to be done on a fair and honest basis. One of the criticisms that I have received is that parish councils are given additional responsibilities by their district or county councils for matters for which the county or district councils may have equal responsibility—for example, grass-cutting in churchyards and along the sides of roads is a responsibility that can be exercised by county or district councils and also by parish councils—but some local authorities do not give parish councils sufficient warning of their intention to pull out of this activity.
My parish council provides such an example. Before the beginning of the current financial year, parish and town councils set their precepts and budgets. My parish council did not require any money for grass-cutting because until that point the Isle of Wight county council had undertaken it. But the county council later in its own budget-making process provided insufficient resources—that is the term they always use—for grass-cutting in parished areas, although it continued to cut the grass in unparished areas. So a very small parish council with a small budget found itself having to pick up responsibility for keeping its verges and churchyards tidy.
Greater involvement and a more effective process of consultation are required between county or district councils and parish or town councils. I am not suggesting that the Government should legislate on or regulate these factors because any well-intentioned and well-run county or district council should pursue them as a matter of course. As hon. Members have suggested on other clauses, if we are not satisfied with the way in which our county or district councils behave—this applies also to parish councils—we have the opportunity to chuck the blighters out.
My hon. Friend the Member for Cotswold referred also to the snoopers charter created by the Government through the standards board. It requires parish councillors to provide a huge amount of information about their activities, possessions, friends and shareholdings, despite the fact that such information has no bearing whatever on their performance as parish councillors.
I give an example from the Daily Telegraph on 13 January this year. Chris Garner of Kings Langley in Hertfordshire is one of a huge number of parish councillors who have chosen to resign or retire or, in his case, not to sign the snoopers charter, and who have been disciplined by the standards board for England as a result of the charter set up by the Government under the Local Government Act 2000.