Warwickshire Liberal Democrats reject “Take it or leave it” offer from West Midlands Council bosses

Ahead of an Extraordinary Meeting of Warwickshire County Council this Thursday (3 Sept 2015) to decide whether or not the county should seek to enter into the proposed West Midlands Combined Authority, the Liberal Democrat group on the council has been canvassing views from across the districts and boroughs and from colleagues in Coventry. Liberal Democrat members from around Warwickshire gathered at Shire Hall on Friday to discuss the proposals.

Lib Dems believe that the "take it or leave it" offer from the seven metropolitan West Midlands councils, to join a Combined Authority as a non-voting member, is unacceptable in its current form. They continue to believe that a Coventry & Warwickshire combined authority would provide the best solution to provide a strong economic base for growth for the county.

Cllr Jerry Roodhouse, the county's Liberal Democrat Group Leader, said:

"It is very unclear what Warwickshire would gain from joining a Combined Authority of metropolitan councils stretching from Coventry to the Black Country. This county already performs better than all but one of the other councils across a wide range of economic indicators - e.g. skills, unemployment levels and gross value added per head.

"We're being asked to pay into creating a new layer of regional bureaucracy and cost to local taxpayers, but with no vote on how pooled budgets might be prioritised and spent. We're concerned that our full Local Transport budget would be lost, with a big question mark about services such as Fire & Rescue and Police. Might it mean a single Police & Crime Commissioner for the whole of an enlarged West Midlands region, or might we face rule by a metropolitan mayor?"

The Liberal Democrats also want to see much more information on financial and economic costs and benefits of such a "super council" made available, and proper consultation with the citizens of Warwickshire, before any such momentous decisions are made. They are highly critical of Conservative and Labour leaders of all the councils concerned for conducting negotiations largely in secret, and failing to spell out to their local residents the nature and impacts of the proposals under discussion.