by Robin’s ‘Hood Many of us have had concerns about the executive mayoral model, especially in unitary councils run as one party states with no effective opposition. Recent events in Newham, East London, illustrate what can go wrong. Three councillors (5% of the total) have currently been placed in administrative suspension by the national Labour Party, […]
Posts Tagged ‘Elected Mayors’
Agreeing with Harry Phibbs on accountability in local governemnt
Mar 18th, 2015 by Jon Lansman.Far be it for me to agree with Harry Phibbs (and possibly even Eric Pickles), but it seems that, on this one issue at least, I do. Harry Phibbs was the man who got the Federation of Conservative Students shut down for being too right-wing but is now the local government editor of ConservativeHome and a right-wing […]
Share:
Why are the most powerful Labour politicians also the least accountable?
Jan 18th, 2013 by Jon Lansman.Directly elected Mayors in England are, without doubt, the most powerful English politicians around, with the exception of the Prime Minister. They have unparalleled executive powers, sufficient powers of patronage to ensure they are untroubled by dissenters in their own parties, and the comfort of knowing that it requires a two-thirds majority to overturn their […]
Share:
Of directly elected mayors, democracy and the large gap in between
May 6th, 2012 by Jon Lansman.The people have spoken but will the commentariat listen? Every large city that was asked whether it wanted a directly mayor this week rejected the idea bar one. Birmingham, Bradford, Coventry, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Sheffield, Wakefield, all said no by majorities between 6% and 30%. The people of Liverpool, quite disgracefully, weren’t consulted. The […]
Share:
Six minimum reforms for making directly elected mayors more accountable
Apr 16th, 2012 by Jon Lansman.Appearing on Newsnight to oppose directly elected mayors (catch it here for another few days though the format was not so great), I reflected on the fact that regardless of the strong arguments against elected mayors (mine are here), at the next election there will nevertheless be a number of elected mayors — mostly as […]
Share:
The case for elected mayors
Nov 28th, 2011 by Ben Mitchell.Isn’t it about time people knew who was running their towns and cities? If directly elected mayors achieve anything, it will surely be to make local government, and the people who run it, more visible, and therefore more answerable. It will catapult regional politics from something that takes place, away from the public gaze, in […]
Share:
Oppose directly elected Mayors – bad for democracy and bad for Labour
Nov 17th, 2011 by Jon Lansman.It isn’t often that we agree with John Spellar, but we’re happy to say that we did yesterday when he came out at Progress against a directly elected Mayor for Birmingham, and what he called the “arcane constitutional debate” about the whole issue. Directly elected Mayors have already proved bad for democracy and bad for […]
