Toulmin Smith

Have you ever heard of Toulmin Smith? He is perhaps the only thinker in that melting pot of Victorian ideas which underpins our current institutions who believed passionately in local determination.

For the rest, very few argued for the sort of respect for local decision making which happens in the USA or even in France

Where is this leading? It leads to the following story set out in the article attached to this headline about a planning application refused by a County Council concerning the highly controversial issue of nuclear waste.

The article explains “Planning permission had been denied by Northamptonshire County Council and a local referendum had damned the scheme but Augean [the disposal company] appealed to the secretary of state saying the 250,000 tonnes would be mainly made up of relatively uncontaminated rubble and other debris. It argued that the facility has accepted hazardous waste without harmful effect on the environment or local economy.”

I am not personally convinced by the case for or against nuclear power and it would be improper to take sides in Hinterland on that issue. I make a more general point about Local/Central Government relations.

It seems to me, and this article is just one very specific example, that all my professional life there has been lots of rhetoric about localism but very little actual ceding of power on things that matter from National to Local Government.