The ruling Conservatives on Rushcliffe Borough Council have been condemned by Labour for a £64,000 “waste of money” cost of hiring consultants to back its option for local government reorganisation.
It’s paying business consultants KPMG to make the case for Rushcliffe to merge with neighbouring Gedling and Newark. Now the Tory leadership has put the merger idea on “pause” after Newark and Gedling rejected the whole idea.
Labour’s also criticised Rushcliffe’s Conservatives for misleading voters over its “Save Rushcliffe” election campaign last May.
“The merger plan was always going to be a fantasy because it just didn’t meet the government’s essential criteria that the new unitary councils should be financial sustainable,” said Rushcliffe’s Labour Group leader, Councillor Jen Walker.
“We’re angry that people in Rushcliffe have been misled in this way because the government always wanted local councils to work together and come up with the best solution to deliver local services.
“But Rushcliffe went its own way offering a fallacy to voters. It was clear months ago that none of the other councils in Nottinghamshire supported Rushcliffe’s alternative model, while the other councils worked together around three more realistic options.”
The government wants to replace the current local authority set-up and create brand new larger unitary councils, to make savings and to streamline local service delivery.
At Thursday’s meeting of Rushcliffe Borough Council, Labour voted against the Conservatives’ approach to local government reform and its “pause” on its own merger option.
Labour’s now urging the council to engage “in a meaningful way” with the rest of Nottinghamshire and Nottingham City about want may or may not work with local government boundary changes.
Added Cllr Walker: “This is a challenging situation requiring careful thought. In Rushcliffe, there’s not been sufficient consideration for all the options available to us that could improve service provision, which is the aim of local government reorganisation.”
A Rushcliffe Borough Council spokesperson said: “The Council continues to acknowledge how important it is to assess all the possible Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) options in the best interests of Rushcliffe residents. It is important to note that this process of undertaking LGR has been instigated by central government, not the Borough Council.
“The work to date with KPMG has ensured we can further assess the best options including discounting or pausing them as the Council thinks is appropriate.
“The exercise has shown the synergies between different parts of Nottinghamshire and Nottingham and further recognised what may be best for Rushcliffe and this was the right thing to do for residents ahead of an engagement process in due course.”
• Councillors vote in favour of Rushcliffe, Newark, Ashfield, Bassetlaw, and Mansfield unitary council option
