Millions wasted on vote doomed to fail

Yorkshire Today
Simon McGee, Political Editor, 01/03/2005

MILLIONS of pounds of public money spent on the regional assembly campaign could have been saved if Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott had listened to his own private polling.

More than a year before his dream for the North was shot down in flames, Ministers were warned in focus group research that scepticism in the three Northern regions was rife.

Fears over the financial costs of a new tier of regional government were uppermost in voters' minds , the study commissioned between October 2003 and July 2004 found.It also revealed that despite the millions spent on the Your Say publicity campaign, only 48 per cent of Yorkshire voters registered any awareness of the concept of elected regional assemblies four months before the planned referendum last year.

The North-East region – the only one to go ahead with a referendum after the polls in Yorkshire and Humber and the North-West were "postponed" because they were considered unwinnable – killed and buried Mr Prescott's scheme for good last November with a massive 78 per cent vote against.

Results of the hitherto-private NOP World polling, now seen by the Yorkshire Post, revealed fears over the "potential financial wastage and increased bureaucracy".

Tory regions spokesman Bernard Jenkin said the "covert polling" showed Ministers underestimated the strength of people's feeling and attacked the Government for spending taxpayers' money in the pursuit of political aims.