Letter: No One Would Notice if Local Government Were Abolished Tomorrow

Published on: 21 Jul, 2025
Updated on: 21 Jul, 2025

By David Roberts

In response to: The Devil Remains in the Detail of this Sorry Mess of a Bill

Mr Quoroll is absolutely right as always. “Devolution” for Surrey means yet more of the opposite: centralisation.

Elections postponed for years, twelve councils shrunk into two, a fake public consultation, and the gimmick of a preening mayor likely to be elected on a populist platform pandering to people’s worst instincts – these are not features of a mature democracy with strong institutions.

The problem, however, is that centralisation is so extreme already that the public has long stopped caring. Unless they read The Dragon, they see almost no information at all about local government. This means that the government can get away with virtually anything, even conspiring with the Tories still squatting on their expired mandate at Surrey County Council.

Mr Quoroll talks of nails in coffins. But for the overwhelming majority of Surrey’s (pretty deracinated) population, civic pride died generations ago, along with any sense of local belonging or agency. Local government could be abolished tomorrow and no-one would notice. But that does not make it less worrying.

Look at Switzerland, the country of my other nationality, and see just how badly we are being managed. There, everything is done by consensus and direct democracy down to parish level. Power is “devolved” up, as it should be, not down.

The system is infernally complacent and slow (like Mr Quoroll’s committee system) but incredibly sure, producing painstakingly debated decisions which then stick. Nothing is left to chance or personal ego and, naturally, most outcomes are a messy but effective compromise.

Most would agree that Switzerland, despite having no natural resources and a 27 per cent foreign population, is well run. But compromise, key to its success, is something the British these days seem to despise.

Responses to Letter: No One Would Notice if Local Government Were Abolished Tomorrow

John Murray Reply

July 21, 2025 at 4:35 pm

What a cheerful chap!

Reading his article I could not help but be reminded of the song I’ve Got a Little List from The Mikado. It catalogues people who would not be missed and thus would make suitable candidates for the services of The Lord High Executioner:

Then there’s that idiot who praises,
With enthusiastic tone,
Every century but this,
Every country but his own.
- David Roberts Reply
  
  July 22, 2025 at 6:21 pm
  
  But I have two countries, as I said. In comparable countries local democracy works. In Britain it generally doesn’t. We can console ourselves with blinkered patriotism or else try and learn from others.