Dragon Interview: Fiona Davidson on the ‘Devolution’ Proposals for Surrey

Published on: 1 Mar, 2025
Updated on: 4 Mar, 2025

Our local government is about to undergo the biggest shake-up in 50 years.

The Labour government is doing away with borough and county councils in favour of unitary authorities responsible for the delivery of all council services in their designated areas. But how much do you know about what is planned?

County councillor Fiona Davidson (R4GV, Guildford South East) explained to a meeting of the Guildford Vision Group what she had gleaned about the proposals and kindly agreed to reiterate the same information in an interview with Dragon NEWS editor Martin Giles.

Fiona Davidson about to brief the Guildford Vision Group on Surrey’s devolution proposals.

Did you know, for instance, that it is believed Surrey is the only county that has been accepted for the fast-track reorganisation and that whatever happens it seems that Guildford will be grouped with debt-ridden Woking?

Please watch…

Responses to Dragon Interview: Fiona Davidson on the ‘Devolution’ Proposals for Surrey

Ian Osgood Reply

March 2, 2025 at 5:04 pm

It seems as though the public are being sold down the river again. How much is this all going to cost?

Fat cats get fatter and we pay for it. We will be investing so much power in one person, ie whoever is the new mayor.

Who do you fancy? Boris, Liz, Kwasi or maybe Priti or Dominic will find his way back from Barnard Castle in time to stitch us all up again.

Honesty, integrity and service, I would suggest, are pre-requisites for the role of mayor but are not words often associated with politicians of any hue these days. It’s enough to make you weep.
- John Perkins Reply
  
  March 12, 2025 at 10:06 pm
  
  Including the phrase “politicians of any hue” later does not excuse the one-sided list of people Mr Osgood suggests would not be suitable for the position of Mayor. It’s blatantly biased.
  
  For balance, perhaps he should have included any or all of the present senior cabinet members, especially as it’s the Deputy PM who’s pushing this through.
John Redpath Reply

March 6, 2025 at 9:38 am

Fiona Davidson’s interview was thorough and informative but where does money come from for heritage assets: the museum, Guildford House and the Guildhall to mention a few? With no town council is a mayor from, say, Reigate going to care about unitary heritage assets?

If we had a town council would it get sufficient funding? If the capital of a west Surrey unitary isn’t in Guildford then we’ll be in big trouble. Would Godalming care for Guildford if it was the home for the unitary authority?

It’s important we all work to making sure Guildford is the centre of any new unitary, no matter what form that might take.

John Redpath is a former R4GV borough councillor
Geoff Cox Reply

March 9, 2025 at 4:39 pm

So they want to create Unitary authorities and then add a mayoral authority over that. So it’s not unitary at all.

The real reason for all this is to create easily corrupted and controlled Mayors. Even if elected by us no one person can ever be capable of “running” such a complex set of problems. Instead of pragmatism, we will experience dogma – just like London, Manchester, Birmingham etc.

I say, cut Government / local authority spending in half and then we would have a reasonable chance of running services well.