Yippee it’s the local government elections on the 18th of May. An event that is nearly as engaging as watching paint dry. The lamp posts have been defaced by banal graffiti like” politics that can work” and faces on posters that could rightly be deemed a driving hazard. Many of these new millennial faces will be seen for the first time when they knock on your door. In addition, you will have the pleasure of canvassers knocking on your door, spouting their preprepared strap lines and giving you leaflets that should be left in their original form, as trees.
We have 11 councils, with some 450 councillors who get an annual basic allowance of £16000.00 pa plus whatever else they can screw out of ratepayers, costing in total more than £10m per annum. The expected saving from 26 to 11 councils have not been delivered and councils are still filled with public sector bureaucrats who react to change at the speed of a beached whale. Councils are run by Chief Executive Officers and senior officials (middle-level managers in the private sector) earning anything from £110,000 to £150,000(the salary of a CEO employed in a large complex company in the private sector, accountable to shareholders) per annum. Not picking on Newry and Mourne council, but Newry.ie reported that the CEO has a salary of more than £150,000 p.a., yes you heard right, £150,000. They also reported that the council had 21000 sick days in 2022, that’s 22 days for each of its 900 employees, average days lost in the private sector 5.
We have 11 councils serving some 1.8 m people, making NI local councils roughly the same size in population equivalent to middle-ranking district authorities in England. The largest English councils such as Greater Manchester each serve 2-3 million people, significantly larger than Noethern Ireland as a whole. Just on that measure alone, it is not value for money. Local councils in NI have a narrower range and fewer responsibilities than their counterparts in the rest of the UK. The services provided by councils here are; waste collection, street cleaning, off-street parking, health and safety, environmental protection, licensing, sports facilities, parks, community centres and the arts, as well as local planning, economic development (a joke), tourism and heritage services. A recent report by the Public Accounts Committee deemed the devolved planning system was poorly led, the worst example of silo working in the public sector, lacked public trust, and to top it all, CORRUPT. It takes years to publish an area development plans which by the time publication is past its sell-by date. This is because councillors are not up to speed on planning issues /policy and its impact on economic development. Councillors must be upskilled before they enter the chamber, giving them a better understanding of the mechanics of organisation. This would allow them to be better and more effective at holding officials to account, by being able to challenge policies and practices around the delivery of services, weed out waste and inefficiencies, which I am sure there are plenty of, challenge officials on vanity projects (Belfast Stories £100M) and ultimately decide if the organisation structure is fit for purpose.
Unfortunately, until then, “goalkeeping” career council bureaucrats will continue to gaslight councillors. Let’s be clear, the local government structure needs to be overhauled and let’s be honest, you are not voting for councillors based on competencies, experience, knowledge or achievements but on political affiliation.
Suneil Sharma
5th May 2023
The Gob 
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