Local Government Finance

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 7:31 pm on 2 February 2005.

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Photo of Sir David Amess Sir David Amess Conservative, Southend West 7:31, 2 February 2005

It is not. I will come to the Minister's remark in a moment.

When I first arrived in Southend, the authority had decided to become unitary. At first that worked extremely well financially, but unfortunately—as the Minister of State knows only too well—it has recently not been to the authority's financial advantage.

In Southend we had many brilliant leaders of our council. Norman Harris and Norman Clarke, for instance, are well known as local government pioneers. The leaders who have followed those two gentlemen are every bit as able, but because of the Government's continual interference with local government, they have not been able to develop Southend as they would have liked to. Last year Southend borough council had to make savings of £7 million to bring spending levels down to the formula spending share, and council tax increased by 6.8 per cent.

I would have expected the Under-Secretary to listen to the points I made a year ago about the census. If the Minister of State had allowed me to intervene when he opened the debate—