Pickles under attack over plan for referendums on council tax rises
In my mind you cant have a pick and mix approach to local accountability. You either choose your representatives through the ballot box or you run the country through referenda. How would Westminster feel about the need for a plebiscite every time they did anything financial? I have not met anyone in “the local Government family” who is positive about the approach profiled in the article below which tells us:
Eric Pickles, the communities secretary, is facing opposition from the home secretary, Theresa May, and the Liberal Democrats over plans to force all councils and police authorities to hold a council-wide referendum if they propose a council tax rise of more than 1%.
At present, councils are free to raise council tax by up to 2% without being required to stage a referendum. No council has taken the option, although the Green party in Brighton was planning to do so at one point.
The new threshold would leave councils facing real-terms cuts in their budgets due to inflation. Pickles had wanted to cut the referendum trigger to 1.5% for 2014-15 but pulled back.
He is planning to announce the lower threshold for 2015-16 on Wednesday, the same day as the local government finance settlement, but May has warned that police budgets are already under serious strain and it would cost police and crime commissioners £1.1m to stage a referendum if they wished to raise the police precept by more than 1%.