More rumblings across the country...just a matter of time

This is Plymouth
http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk
CALLS TO SCRAP THE REGIONAL ASSEMBLEY
12:00 - 06 December 2004
A row over the upgrading of one of Devon's vital road corridors has opened a new can of worms over the South West's Regional Assembly.The assembly pressed for an upgrading of the A303/A30 but its pleas went unheard by the Department of Transport, which this week opted instead to improve the A358 from Ilminster to the M5 at Taunton.Today the assembly has demanded to know why its views were ignored - amid calls from Plymouth business leaders to scrap the organisation because it has no teeth at national level.

Even one of its members, South Hams District Council leader Richard Yonge, has admitted he finds it difficult to see what purpose the assembly serves - and would scrap it.Mr Yonge said he believed the assembly would be ditched if the Tories were in power. "I don't want it," he said. "It's never done anything for us. If the Government changes it will probably go, but we'll all end up with regional assemblies if it doesn't."

Councillor David Morrish, Devon County Council's executive member for the environment, said: "What's the point of having a Regional Assembly, which is designed to give a local voice to decisions which are being taken nationally, when it's totally ignored?"

The Transport Secretary's decision effectively leaves the area with only one strategic road route into the far South West."An upgrade to the A303/A30 would have provided additional capacity to accommodate peak weekend and bank holiday traffic to and from Devon and Cornwall, with the M5 west of Taunton already close to capacity at these times."The Secretary of State has ignored the views of everyone - local authorities, the business community and the people and parishes of the Blackdown Hills."

The assembly urged the Government earlier this year to back the A303/A30 project, which many regard as a vital alternative route between Plymouth and London.But its bid was turned down and a top Plymouth businessman is leading calls for the unelected assembly now to be dissolved.

Neill Mitchell, chief executive of the Devon and Cornwall Business Council, said the assembly should put itself up for election.The body, which meets in Exeter but is based in Taunton, costs around £4.5 million a year to run, paid from the public purse.He said: "While the assembly doesn't actually cost us much directly, there are lots of hidden expenses in terms of the time committed by people who attend its committees and sub-committees."Mr Mitchell said the assembly had put its efforts into developing a regional planning strategy, transport and the environment. He said: "It's wasting everybody's time - but we feel there is the need for an economic strategy."Mr Mitchell added: "The Government has presumed to progressively put powers into the hands of regional assemblies, but the one thing that hasn't happened is that these assemblies have become democratic."The South West does not have an assembly which is elected directly. I don't think as a business body that we would wish to deprive people of the opportunity of having an assembly, but we feel that it should be tested by the public."

Plymouth City Council sends four members to the assembly - leader Tudor Evans, Kevin Wigens, George Wheeler and Karen Gillard - at a 'membership' cost of just over £22,000 per year.The 117-member assembly is part of a secretariat which also runs the South West Provincial Employers' Organisation and the South West Local Government Association.Mr Wheeler defended the body's existence, but admitted its future might be in doubt after a referendum in the North-East firmly rejected an elected assembly.

Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has made it clear the South West's regional assembly is here to stay and says he has no intention of scrapping it or its secretariat, despite the mothballing of plans for referendums on making it a directly-elected assembly.