Do we need fewer politicians?

Former Member

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/bristol/3045193.stm


Here in Bristol, it's getting quite comfortable having no effective local authority leadership. The council issued a statement saying services will continue to run as normal and they do.

There is no noticeable effect apart from making one wonder if this could work long-term. With the regional development agencies, national and European representation in both parliaments, is there a need for local councillors or at least so many.

Former Member

i would like to think that fewer politicians are needed. fewer are certainly wanted. but i know buggar all about running local/national government.
i'd put my money on an awful lot of them being totaly pointless.

Former Member

Well since May 1st I'm not sure there is a point anymore. By the next meeting we will have gone for a month without them. I'm sure will survive.

Former Member

Originally posted by BlackArab
Well since May 1st I'm not sure there is a point anymore. By the next meeting we will have gone for a month without them. I'm sure will survive.

i'm curious about this. keep us posted. it would be very interesting if things actualy worked better wouldn't it. watching the useless justifying themselves!

Former Member

I fear that the leaders of the national parties will crack the whips soon so the puppet show continues.

Will let you know.................laters

Former Member

I'd say that the UK has fewer politicians than in other nations (such as the US). In the USA, the average person has to vote for the president, Congressmen and Senators plus numerous positions at local government level.

Former Member

I think Bristol will do fine for now but eventually soemthing will happen that requires a decsion to be made or locals will want a decision made, someone has to decide how to sepnd the budget for example so I think they are needed really..........

Former Member

I definitely think it could be organised with a better structure;

PM and Parliament (Foreign or whole UK affairs)
^
Regional Assembly (English, Scottish, NI and Welsh)
^
Town/Village/City Councils covering a certain area.

Former Member

I see a need for maybe some local representation but we could cut numbers and achieve less political time-wasting between the parties. This in my experience stops things getting done not necessarily the needs or wants of the electorate.

Former Member

Re: Do we need fewer politicians?

Originally posted by BlackArab
Here in Bristol, it's getting quite comfortable having no effective local authority leadership.

Maybe they should cut cards to decide who gets to be in charge:
http://icayrshire.icnetwork.co.uk/news/localnews/ayr/page.cfm?objectid=12981982&method=full&siteid=73592&headline=NEW%20PROVOST%20WINS%20AT%20CARDS

Edited due to bad link.

Former Member

The thing I find about politians is they may have come via Oxford and Cambridge, have multiple letters after their name, etc. but very few people in power excercise what I call "Common Sense".

The millenium Dome is perhaps the best illustration of where common sense was not applied.

I live near 4 tube stations and could fairly easily get to the dome if I wanted to but I didn't - it had no appeal for me at all. So then I have to ask myself well, what appeal does it have for people in the midlands, wales, or as far away as Scotland?

And to fork out a Billion pounds to build it and then ask another £20 to see it was pretty insulting.

Our local council took one area and decided it need to be revitalised so they spend £1 million blocking off all the traffic to the area so people could walk around the area more easily .. what happened? ... well cos people couldn't drive into the area now they stopped going there and it turned the place into a ghost town.

Former Member

FEWER POLITICIANS

Former Member

To be honest you could enormously reduce the number of politicians by enacting a few simple measures:

1. Reduce the number of councillors per ward to one instead of three. Most are all from the same party anyway so it'd have little effect.

2. Abolish all local councils which are a confusing quagmire that few people know or care about. Instead have one representative from each ward go to a regional assembly which would decide on the things councils and regional quangos/assemblies currently decide on including the emergency services, education, social services etc.

The benefits would be:
- a single, easily recognised body of local government which would have noticeable powers over every day life thus encouraging people to take an interest.
- there is still local representation through having one member for each ward.
- cost savings from selling and amalgamating numerous town halls and local government bureaucracies and reducing the number of councillors by two thirds. Also there would be cost savings from awarding contracts because of the economics of scale which could be achieved by awarding contracts regionally rather than locally.

Of course this will never happen because no party is going to annoy two thirds of its councillors which is a hell of a lot of party members by reducing councillors representation to one per ward.