Poots defends delay in 'super councils'
ENVIRONMENT Minister Edwin Poots has defended the delay on Ulster's proposed new 'super councils'.
Newly-appointed government minister Hugo Swire has written to Mr Poots urging him to decide by the end of the month if the next round of district council elections, scheduled for May 2011, are to be on the basis of 11 councils or the existing 26.
In a statement to the News Letter, Mr Poots said he was "more concerned" that council reform would deliver "real savings to the ratepayer".
He said local government had been working on a "new service delivery model" for three months.
"My principal objective is to make sure there is a model in place that will deliver services to the ratepayer more efficiently.
"Although the framework for this new model has been agreed, there is a considerable amount of work still to be done. I have asked local government to take this work forward as quickly as possible," said the Environment Minister.
In a seeming break with the NIO's carefully-worded diplomacy under Labour ministers, Mr Squire, who is a minister of state under Secretary of State Owen Paterson, said the ongoing uncertainty meant that a senior government employee appointed almost a year ago to help organise next year's election has been unable to begin his work.
Despite the Stormont Executive asking the Westminster government to delay the council elections back in 2009, the order to give effect to the new local government boundaries has still not been brought before the Assembly.
The 2009 agreement – to postpone the elections until May 2011 – was drawn up so they could take place on the basis of the new 11-council model.
The programme to take the plan forward, agreed between the NIO and the Department of the Environment, required the early appointment of a commissioner by the Secretary of State and an order passed by the Assembly confirming the new boundaries.
A statement from the NIO said: "The commissioner was appointed on 1 July 2009 but has been unable to commence substantive work on the grouping of wards because the Assembly has still not passed the Order."
The statement added: "The minister told Mr Poots that it was still possible to hold the elections to 11 new councils in May 2011 but a decision to bring the Order before the Assembly needed to be made before the end of the month otherwise planning for elections in May 2011 would have to be on the basis of the existing 26 councils."
A total of 9 million has already been spent on the boundary restructuring project which many councillors are convinced will never materialise.
It's understood Mr Poots is set to present a paper to the Executive on Thursday on the future of the councils.
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