Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Sept 28, 2016 7:41:12 GMT
Argyll & Bute could also benefit from the proposed 1 and 2 seaters from the islands bill. The obvious ones would seem to be: Mull (1 member) Tiree & Coll (1 member) Islay, Jura & Colonsay (1 member) Bute (2 members) These would all fit well. Most of the other difficulties from the proposals were from wards which crossed the four administrative area boundaries (especially the proposed Mid Argyll ward). These would be easier to avoid with the islands allowed more flexibility on number of members and electoral parity. North Ayrshire would also benefit from having Arran as a 1 member ward. Cumbrae I'm less convinced by as the population is a little too small and it fits better with Largs than Arran does with Ardrossan. In Highland Skye is it's own ward anyway while the rest of the islands are too small. I think the bill is good in that Island communities shouldn't be an afterthought, which they often are when it comes to local government. Adding a few extra wwards around Scottish councils isn't going to upset things too much; local councils are supposed to be well..local. Though I'm someone who thinks councils are too large anyway, given that since reorganisation we now have a Parliament, so councils should be a little smaller and a little more empowered. My theoretical preference is for slightly fewer, larger councils but with a more powerful smaller unit beneath it, not a return to two tiers exactly but "Burghs" with representation, some budget and powers although probably not separate staff from the parent authority. Something basically more powerful than Ward Committees / Community Councils but not a whole new tier of government. My real world experience of Community Councils and local representatives fills me with dread about how such an idea would work but I think it is still probably the right thing to do.
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Post by afleitch on Sept 28, 2016 17:33:33 GMT
I think it's fair to say that certain areas have suffered with the loss of the Regions; transport, roads, planning, social work (not the service itself but the co-ordination). There was nothing wrong with Strathclyde Regional Council for example; it was successful and generally liked by the time it was abolished. It was Labour dominated, but that was an issue with the electoral system which we have now sorted.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Sept 29, 2016 7:32:33 GMT
I think it's fair to say that certain areas have suffered with the loss of the Regions; transport, roads, planning, social work (not the service itself but the co-ordination). There was nothing wrong with Strathclyde Regional Council for example; it was successful and generally liked by the time it was abolished. It was Labour dominated, but that was an issue with the electoral system which we have now sorted. I think Strathclyde probably was a bit too big with Argyll and Ayrshire probably being the bits that shouldn't have been included. There are now mechanisms like the Glasgow City deal that provide some strategic co-ordination across the Glasgow / Renfrewshire / Lanarkshire / Dunbartonshire area and more co-operation at this sort of level would be useful.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Dec 15, 2016 6:40:16 GMT
I think Strathclyde probably was a bit too big with Argyll and Ayrshire probably being the bits that shouldn't have been included. There are now mechanisms like the Glasgow City deal that provide some strategic co-ordination across the Glasgow / Renfrewshire / Lanarkshire / Dunbartonshire area and more co-operation at this sort of level would be useful. If Glasgow and its surrounding councils are to be morphed into some abhorrent city region then it makes sense to include Helensburgh in that city region as the town and its surrounding areas have reasonably close ties to Dumbarton and the Vale of Leven in West Dunbartonshire. The remaining elements of the Argyll and Bute council area, which tend to be much more rural in nature, have more in common with the rest of the Scottish Highlands (the Highland council area). In contrast with this you have the juxtaposition of the affluent rural southern parts of Lanarkshire (Clydesdale), which has as much in common with Glasgow as it does with Ayrshire and the Scottish Borders! . My view is that Glasgow is so big and different to elsewhere in Scotland as to need a different solution. I personally would favour some sort of upper tier to allow co-ordination while maintaining smaller councils beneath that level too. These City region functions exist already to an extent but lack democratic accountability. Wanlockhead or Biggar are obviously not closely related to Glasgow but there will always be edge cases. No easy answers to what to do with Glasgow.
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Post by afleitch on Jan 3, 2017 14:36:12 GMT
Glasgow needs it's suburbs. Bearsden is Glasgow. Newton Mearns is Glasgow.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 4, 2017 10:54:27 GMT
Glasgow needs it's suburbs. Bearsden is Glasgow. Newton Mearns is Glasgow. I have some sympathy with that as a Newton Mearns resident. I use Glasgow facilities like the Museums and Theatres, Pollok Park, Shops, Buses etc. However once you start talking about paying Glasgow Council Tax and having Glasgow taking over the running of East Renfrewshire schools you will shortly have a revolution on your hands which is why neither Labour nor SNP have expressed any interest in creating a Greater Glasgow authority. And if you are looking at maintaining the unitary system Glasgow is already at the upper end of Unitaries in the UK with a population of 600K and around 11% of the population of Scotland. Even adding just East Renfrewshire and East Dunbartonshire you are looking at 800k and 15% of the population. If you throw in Rutherglen, Cambuslang, Stepps, Moodiesburn, Clydebank and Kilpatrick to get a more logical Glasgow you are looking at a population of 1m and getting on for 20% of Scotland in one local authority. Even then places like Paisley, Uddingston, East Kilbride, Dumbarton equally act as suburbs to Glasgow and have a similar level of usage of city centre facilities as do Newton Mearns and Bearsden. So the logic for including them in a Glasgow authority is much the same. You're then up to 1.8m people and fully 33% of the Scottish population. That is clearly absurd as a unitary authority. So we come back to the two options of maintaining the status quo or recognising that Glasgow is different and needs something additional at a higher level to run some of the regional level facilities like Museums, Strategic Planning, Transportation, Economic Development etc. As I've said my preference for such a body would not quite bring back Strathclyde as I'd exclude Ayrshire and Argyll & Bute (though not Helensburgh & Lomond). I'd also like to see Glasgow shrink under such a proposal, with some mergers into surrounding authorities and changes to some of the bigger ones - especially the Lanarkshires.
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Post by afleitch on Jan 4, 2017 19:37:28 GMT
Glasgow needs it's suburbs. Bearsden is Glasgow. Newton Mearns is Glasgow. I have some sympathy with that as a Newton Mearns resident. I use Glasgow facilities like the Museums and Theatres, Pollok Park, Shops, Buses etc. However once you start talking about paying Glasgow Council Tax and having Glasgow taking over the running of East Renfrewshire schools you will shortly have a revolution on your hands which is why neither Labour nor SNP have expressed any interest in creating a Greater Glasgow authority. And if you are looking at maintaining the unitary system Glasgow is already at the upper end of Unitaries in the UK with a population of 600K and around 11% of the population of Scotland. Even adding just East Renfrewshire and East Dunbartonshire you are looking at 800k and 15% of the population. If you throw in Rutherglen, Cambuslang, Stepps, Moodiesburn, Clydebank and Kilpatrick to get a more logical Glasgow you are looking at a population of 1m and getting on for 20% of Scotland in one local authority. Even then places like Paisley, Uddingston, East Kilbride, Dumbarton equally act as suburbs to Glasgow and have a similar level of usage of city centre facilities as do Newton Mearns and Bearsden. So the logic for including them in a Glasgow authority is much the same. You're then up to 1.8m people and fully 33% of the Scottish population. That is clearly absurd as a unitary authority. So we come back to the two options of maintaining the status quo or recognising that Glasgow is different and needs something additional at a higher level to run some of the regional level facilities like Museums, Strategic Planning, Transportation, Economic Development etc. As I've said my preference for such a body would not quite bring back Strathclyde as I'd exclude Ayrshire and Argyll & Bute (though not Helensburgh & Lomond). I'd also like to see Glasgow shrink under such a proposal, with some mergers into surrounding authorities and changes to some of the bigger ones - especially the Lanarkshires. Strathclyde is Greater Glasgow (okay, maybe not Argyll) and that's the politically inconvenient issue that no one wants to address. In terms of travel to work areas, transport, culture etc and even politics it's homogenous. Ironically the old Region/district set up is more conducive to governance in a devolved system. In many ways the 1995 reorganisation was an anti-devolutionist hit job. Personally I'd bring the whole system back, with a few tweaks here and there.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 4, 2017 20:27:03 GMT
Strathclyde is Greater Glasgow (okay, maybe not Argyll) and that's the politically inconvenient issue that no one wants to address. In terms of travel to work areas, transport, culture etc and even politics it's homogenous. Ironically the old Region/district set up is more conducive to governance in a devolved system. In many ways the 1995 reorganisation was an anti-devolutionist hit job. Personally I'd bring the whole system back, with a few tweaks here and there. I'm a 30 minute drive to the first signs of the Glasgow conurbation - Girvan is over an hour away. I have a Conservative constituency MSP and the Conservatives are the largest party in my local council area (they have one councillor in Glasgow). I don't think so matey. My view is that Ayrshire is different enough from Glasgow that it should be separate. Although I would have a single Ayrshire authority which I suspect won't be to ntyuk1707 's taste. Elsewhere in Scotland though I think that Unitaries work pretty well. Hence my preference for a specific Greater Glasgow solution but unitaries elsewhere.
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 4, 2017 23:45:36 GMT
I'd like to know why should there be a special solution for Glasgow but not elsewhere? South Ayrshire is very distinct from the rest of Ayrshire (being comparatively affluent and very Conservative), North East Fife is very distinct from the more working class areas of Kirkcaldy, Levenmouth and Glenrothes in Fife (significantly more affluent and liberal in nature), Dundee is very different from Angus (urban and more deprived and socialist), Aberdeen much different from southern Aberdeenshire (being more urban and socialist in nature), which is in turn very different from Banff & Buchan (which apparently voted Yes in the independence referendum and Leave in the EU referendum) and so on. The Highlands is geographically huge, encompassing a mixture of areas (Argyll, Lochaber, Skye, Ross, Caithness, Sutherland, Inverness, Badenoch, Nairn, Moray all very distinct from one another). By comparison Greater Glasgow is very homogenous outside of the suburban areas of Eastwood, East Dunbartonshire and Helensburgh! Size primarily. My view is that Local Authorities in Scotland work best with populations of 150,000+ people. In most areas of Scotland that means that 2 tier authorities would end up with too large a geographical area if you have building blocks that are 150k+. Edinburgh is a second possibility but the differing geographies of current Police (just Edinburgh) Health (Edinburgh, 3xLothian) former Police (Edinburgh, 3xLothian and Borders), College (Edinburgh, Mid and East Lothian), Transport (Edinburgh, 3xLothian, Borders, Falkirk, Fife), Planning (Edinburgh 3xLothian, Borders, southern Fife) and the City Deal region (Edinburgh, 3xLothian, Borders, Fife) show how hard it is to reach agreement on what constitutes the wider Edinburgh hinterland. Hence in most areas my preference is for slightly fewer Unitaries getting rid of overly small authorities like Clackmannanshire and Midlothian and correcting poorly drawn dividing lines like Dundee / Angus. Glasgow however is too big for the logical city boundaries to be encapsulated in a single authority so needs a two tier system.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 5, 2017 9:30:02 GMT
Size primarily. My view is that Local Authorities in Scotland work best with populations of 150,000+ people. In most areas of Scotland that means that 2 tier authorities would end up with too large a geographical area if you have building blocks that are 150k+. Edinburgh is a second possibility but the differing geographies of current Police (just Edinburgh) Health (Edinburgh, 3xLothian) former Police (Edinburgh, 3xLothian and Borders), College (Edinburgh, Mid and East Lothian), Transport (Edinburgh, 3xLothian, Borders, Falkirk, Fife), Planning (Edinburgh 3xLothian, Borders, southern Fife) and the City Deal region (Edinburgh, 3xLothian, Borders, Fife) show how hard it is to reach agreement on what constitutes the wider Edinburgh hinterland. Hence in most areas my preference is for slightly fewer Unitaries getting rid of overly small authorities like Clackmannanshire and Midlothian and correcting poorly drawn dividing lines like Dundee / Angus. Glasgow however is too big for the logical city boundaries to be encapsulated in a single authority so needs a two tier system. So the Glasgow districts would each consist of 150,000+? Yes. I'd have a slightly smaller City of Glasgow authority and more suburbs spun off into the neighbouring authorities or perhaps a new authority. East Renfrewshire could gain Priesthill, Nitshill, Darnley, Kennishead, Newlands and Muirend for example. Already the Jenny Lind is functionally part of Thorniebank / Newton Mearns anyway and Darnley / Barrhead barely have a distinction either. Equally I think there is a logic to West Dunbartonshire expanding in NW Glasgow to take on Helensburgh, Bearsden, Milngavie and Drumchapel. The remainder of East Dunbartonshire could take on some small bits of NE Glasgow and the northern part of North Lanarkshire to cover the entire upper Kelvin valley. A lot of the boundaries were drawn for maximum political advantage for the Conservatives in 1995 rather than based on logical boundaries. A better mix of social classes could enable the suburban authorities to do more to help some of the worse performing Glasgow suburban areas by taking them out of Glasgow and providing more local and responsive services. Equally the upper tier / combined authority setup would help take some of the regional functions (and costs) out of Glasgow and better spread those costs across the whole city region. I'd envisage something like 9 authorities overall: Inverclyde (unchanged) Renfrewshire (unchanged) Dunbartonshire (Helensburgh, Dumbarton, Balloch, Clydebank, Bearsden, Milngavie, Drumchapel) Kelvin (Bishopbriggs, Stepps, Lenzie, Kirkintilloch, Kilsyth, Cumbernauld, maybe Robroyston and some small bits of Glasgow) Glasgow (reduced) East Renfrewshire (as above) Cathkin (East Kilbride, Rutherglen, Cambuslang, Castlemilk, Croftfoot) North Lanarkshire (minus Cumbernauld) South Lanarkshire (minus East Kilbride, Rutherglen) That would be an increase of 1 authority overall and Inverclyde would still be a little on the small side still but the other 7 would all be in the 150-250,000 range with legacy Glasgow more like 400-500,000 population. For maximum efficiency you could merge Inverclyde with Renfrewshire to get them all in that 200-300k sweet spot. Not suggesting anything like this is likely to happen but something along those lines would be my ideal scenario. Local government reorganisation will certainly come along at some point and I'd rather preserve the higher responsiveness and higher performance of the suburban authorities than see them merged into an even more unwieldy Glasgow. I also think Glasgow itself would perform better once slimmed down and freed of some of the regional responsibilities to the new combined authority / upper tier.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 5, 2017 12:07:39 GMT
Yes. I'd have a slightly smaller City of Glasgow authority and more suburbs spun off into the neighbouring authorities or perhaps a new authority. East Renfrewshire could gain Priesthill, Nitshill, Darnley, Kennishead, Newlands and Muirend for example. Already the Jenny Lind is functionally part of Thorniebank / Newton Mearns anyway and Darnley / Barrhead barely have a distinction either. Equally I think there is a logic to West Dunbartonshire expanding in NW Glasgow to take on Helensburgh, Bearsden, Milngavie and Drumchapel. The remainder of East Dunbartonshire could take on some small bits of NE Glasgow and the northern part of North Lanarkshire to cover the entire upper Kelvin valley. A lot of the boundaries were drawn for maximum political advantage for the Conservatives in 1995 rather than based on logical boundaries. A better mix of social classes could enable the suburban authorities to do more to help some of the worse performing Glasgow suburban areas by taking them out of Glasgow and providing more local and responsive services. Equally the upper tier / combined authority setup would help take some of the regional functions (and costs) out of Glasgow and better spread those costs across the whole city region. I'd envisage something like 9 authorities overall: Inverclyde (unchanged) Renfrewshire (unchanged) Dunbartonshire (Helensburgh, Dumbarton, Balloch, Clydebank, Bearsden, Milngavie, Drumchapel) Kelvin (Bishopbriggs, Stepps, Lenzie, Kirkintilloch, Kilsyth, Cumbernauld, maybe Robroyston and some small bits of Glasgow) Glasgow (reduced) East Renfrewshire (as above) Cathkin (East Kilbride, Rutherglen, Cambuslang, Castlemilk, Croftfoot) North Lanarkshire (minus Cumbernauld) South Lanarkshire (minus East Kilbride, Rutherglen) That would be an increase of 1 authority overall and Inverclyde would still be a little on the small side still but the other 7 would all be in the 150-250,000 range with legacy Glasgow more like 400-500,000 population. For maximum efficiency you could merge Inverclyde with Renfrewshire to get them all in that 200-300k sweet spot. Not suggesting anything like this is likely to happen but something along those lines would be my ideal scenario. Local government reorganisation will certainly come along at some point and I'd rather preserve the higher responsiveness and higher performance of the suburban authorities than see them merged into an even more unwieldy Glasgow. I also think Glasgow itself would perform better once slimmed down and freed of some of the regional responsibilities to the new combined authority / upper tier. Wow that is horrible. The alternative is probably a Greater Glasgow with East Renfrewshire and East Dunbartonshire merged into Glasgow. Much worse I'd suggest.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 5, 2017 12:14:00 GMT
The alternative is probably a Greater Glasgow with East Renfrewshire and East Dunbartonshire merged into Glasgow. Much worse I'd suggest. Or a two-tier system for Greater Glasgow with East Dunbartonshire and Eastwood forming their own distinctive districts. That is an option but I'd like to see the suburban authorities expand and help improve neighbouring areas. Thornliebank has benefited from being in East Renfrewshire while Kennishead feels like it has been left abandoned by Glasgow as it is so remote to city hall. Demographically they were similar areas 20 years ago but the East Renfrewshire areas are on the up more.
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Post by afleitch on Jan 5, 2017 18:06:12 GMT
I don't think any nation worth its salt, should define 'locality' on the map, by how deprived an area is.
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Jan 5, 2017 20:09:01 GMT
If you're talking about a two-tier solution, I don't see why you have to assume that the central urban area forms one, much larger, authority. Even aside from the nagging suspicion that this is about making sure that the leadership of the other authorities is safely middle-class, what that does is to entrench centre vs. periphery as the fundamental dividing line, and the suburban areas almost always win that battle.
Amongst Britain's metropolitan areas, London is about the only area that isn't defined by that. Not coincidentally, it's also the only authority not to based on a large central authority.
I'd say there's a particularly strong case for doing this if you're reorganising powers anyway. The new authorities won't be doing things like strategic planning, and the remaining roles they've got (mostly providing services) can easily be distributed amongst sub-areas (and in a number of cases, are probably already divided up that way.) Local identity doesn't matter as much if there's another, more recognisable unit at the top.
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Post by afleitch on Jan 5, 2017 21:16:35 GMT
If you're talking about a two-tier solution, I don't see why you have to assume that the central urban area forms one, much larger, authority. Even aside from the nagging suspicion that this is about making sure that the leadership of the other authorities is safely middle-class, what that does is to entrench centre vs. periphery as the fundamental dividing line, and the suburban areas almost always win that battle.Amongst Britain's metropolitan areas, London is about the only area that isn't defined by that. Not coincidentally, it's also the only authority not to based on a large central authority. I'd say there's a particularly strong case for doing this if you're reorganising powers anyway. The new authorities won't be doing things like strategic planning, and the remaining roles they've got (mostly providing services) can easily be distributed amongst sub-areas (and in a number of cases, are probably already divided up that way.) Local identity doesn't matter as much if there's another, more recognisable unit at the top. I agree with that statement (and indeed Eastwood and Bearsden/Milngavie were detached in the final stages of the 1973 act). Greater London works precisely because it was so bold and allows for a '50/50' balance in a connected, definable area.
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Eastwood
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 6, 2017 14:33:51 GMT
If you're talking about a two-tier solution, I don't see why you have to assume that the central urban area forms one, much larger, authority. Even aside from the nagging suspicion that this is about making sure that the leadership of the other authorities is safely middle-class, what that does is to entrench centre vs. periphery as the fundamental dividing line, and the suburban areas almost always win that battle. Amongst Britain's metropolitan areas, London is about the only area that isn't defined by that. Not coincidentally, it's also the only authority not to based on a large central authority. I'd say there's a particularly strong case for doing this if you're reorganising powers anyway. The new authorities won't be doing things like strategic planning, and the remaining roles they've got (mostly providing services) can easily be distributed amongst sub-areas (and in a number of cases, are probably already divided up that way.) Local identity doesn't matter as much if there's another, more recognisable unit at the top. Agreed. Effectively though Glasgow's boundary is pretty much the same as it was when created a County of City in 1930. It gained new open space for new housing in 1931 and 1938 when the Corporation purchased the land that became Drumchapel, Castlemilk and Easterhouse although the housing on these areas wasn't completed until after the war. The only change to the boundaries since the second world war has been the inclusion of some parts of the 9th landward district of Lanarkshire into Glasgow at the 1975 reorganisation (broadly Bailieston, Carmyle, Garrowhill, Mount Vernon). Apart from those new post war estates and that small 1975 adjustment the boundary between Glasgow and its suburbs is effectively an accident of history based on what the boundaries were in 1930. It is probably politically toxic to expand Glasgow any further beyond these historic boundaries as the removal of other areas in the 1973 act showed. So the only way to alter the balance between Glasgow and neighbouring authorities is to move to 2 tier governance and allow the suburban authorities to expand back into the 1930 Glasgow borders. Freezing the geography in place where it was 90 years ago doesn't seem a great idea to me.
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Post by afleitch on Jan 6, 2017 21:01:41 GMT
Also, Glasgow has only just began to arrest it's population decline and Cathcart, Hillhead etc aren't what they once were (Glasgow 50+ years ago was more diverse and did have 'monied' people living within it's boundaries)
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Jan 7, 2017 9:46:31 GMT
If you're talking about a two-tier solution, I don't see why you have to assume that the central urban area forms one, much larger, authority. Even aside from the nagging suspicion that this is about making sure that the leadership of the other authorities is safely middle-class, what that does is to entrench centre vs. periphery as the fundamental dividing line, and the suburban areas almost always win that battle. Amongst Britain's metropolitan areas, London is about the only area that isn't defined by that. Not coincidentally, it's also the only authority not to based on a large central authority. I'd say there's a particularly strong case for doing this if you're reorganising powers anyway. The new authorities won't be doing things like strategic planning, and the remaining roles they've got (mostly providing services) can easily be distributed amongst sub-areas (and in a number of cases, are probably already divided up that way.) Local identity doesn't matter as much if there's another, more recognisable unit at the top. Agreed. Effectively though Glasgow's boundary is pretty much the same as it was when created a County of City in 1930. It gained new open space for new housing in 1931 and 1938 when the Corporation purchased the land that became Drumchapel, Castlemilk and Easterhouse although the housing on these areas wasn't completed until after the war. The only change to the boundaries since the second world war has been the inclusion of some parts of the 9th landward district of Lanarkshire into Glasgow at the 1975 reorganisation (broadly Bailieston, Carmyle, Garrowhill, Mount Vernon). Apart from those new post war estates and that small 1975 adjustment the boundary between Glasgow and its suburbs is effectively an accident of history based on what the boundaries were in 1930. It is probably politically toxic to expand Glasgow any further beyond these historic boundaries as the removal of other areas in the 1973 act showed. So the only way to alter the balance between Glasgow and neighbouring authorities is to move to 2 tier governance and allow the suburban authorities to expand back into the 1930 Glasgow borders. Freezing the geography in place where it was 90 years ago doesn't seem a great idea to me. I agree that a straight return to the pre-1930 borders would be odd. But that's not what I'm really suggesting. A full London-style borough system would probably be too much disruption to work (and this may be true of more limited schemes - there's no point changing structures if the new ones are less effective at delivering services at good value for money) but there's space in between these two options. You might, for example, stick the south-west in with Rutherglen, create a Govan authority in the south-east, give Anniesland to West Dumbartonshire, hive off the north-east (or perhaps pair it with bits of North Lanarkshire and then have the centre and the north as a single authority. I'm not convinced that would be effective, but it'd certainly complicate the centre-periphery divide. It is interesting that the more working class cities of Dundee and Glasgow lack most of their outer suburbs (Monifieth and Sidlaw for Dundee / East Dunbartonshire and Eastwood for Glasgow) whilst the more affluent cities of Aberdeen and Edinburgh have all of their outer suburbs. That would be news to the populations of Musselburgh and Westhill.
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Post by Eastwood on Jan 7, 2017 10:27:06 GMT
Agreed. Effectively though Glasgow's boundary is pretty much the same as it was when created a County of City in 1930. It gained new open space for new housing in 1931 and 1938 when the Corporation purchased the land that became Drumchapel, Castlemilk and Easterhouse although the housing on these areas wasn't completed until after the war. The only change to the boundaries since the second world war has been the inclusion of some parts of the 9th landward district of Lanarkshire into Glasgow at the 1975 reorganisation (broadly Bailieston, Carmyle, Garrowhill, Mount Vernon). Apart from those new post war estates and that small 1975 adjustment the boundary between Glasgow and its suburbs is effectively an accident of history based on what the boundaries were in 1930. It is probably politically toxic to expand Glasgow any further beyond these historic boundaries as the removal of other areas in the 1973 act showed. So the only way to alter the balance between Glasgow and neighbouring authorities is to move to 2 tier governance and allow the suburban authorities to expand back into the 1930 Glasgow borders. Freezing the geography in place where it was 90 years ago doesn't seem a great idea to me. I agree that a straight return to the pre-1930 borders would be odd. But that's not what I'm really suggesting. A full London-style borough system would probably be too much disruption to work (and this may be true of more limited schemes - there's no point changing structures if the new ones are less effective at delivering services at good value for money) but there's space in between these two options. You might, for example, stick the south-west in with Rutherglen, create a Govan authority in the south-east, give Anniesland to West Dumbartonshire, hive off the north-east (or perhaps pair it with bits of North Lanarkshire and then have the centre and the north as a single authority. I'm not convinced that would be effective, but it'd certainly complicate the centre-periphery divide. It is interesting that the more working class cities of Dundee and Glasgow lack most of their outer suburbs (Monifieth and Sidlaw for Dundee / East Dunbartonshire and Eastwood for Glasgow) whilst the more affluent cities of Aberdeen and Edinburgh have all of their outer suburbs. That would be news to the populations of Musselburgh and Westhill. I'm agreeing with you. I just proposed something similar on the last page. The problem with Glasgow is that it hasn't really properly changed its boundaries since 1930. It certainly doesn't work well at the moment so worth trying something else. My idea was to try and avoid creating new authorities where possible as that is expensive but allow Glasgow's neighbours to expand inwards. I do think a new authority would be needed in the SW though
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Sibboleth
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Post by Sibboleth on Jan 7, 2017 10:37:40 GMT
I quite like the idea of having a single metropolitan authority, a local authority covering whatever could be loosely locally understood to be the 'old' city/city proper/whatever (if large enough you could then have smaller boroughs below etc) and a bunch of suburban/satellite town boroughs. This could be translated into rural areas as well and would work as a good starting point for strong local government, which I'm increasingly thinking of as being essential for a well-run country. Centralisation of power (whether to Whitehall, Holyrood, Cardiff Bay...) has been a disaster, but it isn't as though local government in its present form could take a serious transfer back, so the need exists to properly redesign the whole thing so that it can.
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