God's Own County

What \can Sigmund Freud Teach Our Politicians

• The id is the unconscious primitive and instinctual part of the mind that contains sexual and aggressive drives etc. Many politicians spring to mind if you consider this.
• The super-ego brings lots more politicians to mind. It is supposed to operate as a moral conscience: are you following Boris?
• In Yorkshire ‘e-ego on then’ encourages politicians to stand for election again and again and again.

Vote in Yorkshire’s May Local Government Elections

Before you will be allowed to exercise your universal suffrage right to vote you will need to prove your identity or have a registered postal vote.  Voters wishing to apply to their council for free ID should first make sure they are registered to vote. The rules are new and Kirklees MDC  explain  ‘Accepted forms of ID include a UK, European Economic Area  or Commonwealth passport; a UK, EEA or Commonwealth drivers’ licence; and some concessionary travel passes, such as an older person’s bus pass or an Oyster 60+ card’ (in Kirklees I should coco). Voters will be able to use expired ID if they are still recognisable from the photo. I am not recognisable even from any current photograph.

Muddying the waters still further, to get a Voter Authority Certificate you must be registered to vote and register online at www.gov.uk/register-to-vote.

No more being ticked off a list at a polling station more likely an officious third degree from yet more civil?public servants. Will the rule change work to  stimulate electors to generate more or fewer votes. I know what I think.

The New English Dictionary has many definitions for ‘commission’ but number 5 on page 271 states . ‘ an act of committing something: the commission of a crime.’  So have I stumbled on the Yorkshire comma.  Are we to have a body of commissioners seeking out police committing crime called Commission Police, Commissioners. This may be laudable or even necessary for the Met in London where strangely there is no Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC).  Commission Police with or without a comma are not wanted in God’s Own County.

The role of a PCC is to be the voice of the people and hold the police to account. They are responsible for the totality of policing. We elect them, currently in Yorkshire, one Labour, one Conservative and West Yorkshire’s Mayor  . The aim of PCCs is to ‘cut crime and deliver an effective and efficient police service within their police force area’. They are elected by the public to hold Chief Constables and the force to account, making the police answerable to the communities they serve’. West Yorkshire – police governance falls under the remit of the Elected Mayor a pseudo PCC.

Annual salaries for a PCC is South Yorkshire £ 88,600 and North Yorkshire £76,300 and additionally all PCCs must employ a Chief Executive (CEO) and a Chief Finance Officer. PCCs also receive cash from the Government to commission other organisations and groups to improving community safety.

In this post, doubtless, I will have committed many errors, which,  will attract attention from the comma police so I intend referring myself to the Police, Comma, Commissioners but don’t ‘quote’ me on that.

Revised Yorkshire Parliamentary Boundaries

We are overdue for a rebalancing of parliamentary constituencies to relate more closely to current and anticipated populations. The last changes for England & Wales was in  2010 so about 8 years late (normal for the civil service?)

The Boundary Commission current consultations closed last year and final recommendations will go to parliament by 1 July 2023.

Boundary Commission for England recommends changes that must be based on constituencies having no less than 69,724 Parliamentary electors and no more than 77,062 electors. This has led to 650 constituencies distributed to the four parts of the UK as follows:

• England = 543,
• Scotland = 57
• Wales = 32
• Northern Ireland = 18

Yorkshire will be unchanged with 54 constituencies as it happens 10% of the English total. There will be some local tweaking. London and South East will get 9 more MP’s  but the North East and North West  will be reduced by 4.

The detail available is vast and this link provides access to maps and geo data for Yorkshire and Humberside

‘Enough is enough’ as many true Yorkshire folk would say. It is too long since we achieved a repeal of the act of parliament that messed unnecessarily with our county boundaries and organisations. I know you can’t easily unravel such a ball of tangled string but beware of what  follows, more false savings, gerrymandering,  political posturing and another reorganised North Yorkshire Combined Council.

Changes and Effects Caused by the Act

• South Yorkshire was an invented myth that lingers like the taste of  ginger.
• Met Districts became the focus for large authorities with growing power complexes
• Aldermen were killed off and sheriffs were promoted to be high sheriffs and small charter trustees created.
• The new controls  were supposed to be a two-tier the system but turned out to be three-tier and like a lot of local government it grew like Topsy. It retained civil parish councils (arguably the most effective of the lot).
• Health care and water supply / sanitation were taken over by separate, non-elected authorities.(A duff abdication of accountability)
• Recognising some errors the 1990’s brought back the East Riding as a reorganised local government authority  with new boundary changes.
• Political ducking and diving generated last minute ‘geographical’  changes for  Ossett and Rothwell.
• A pound to a penny a reduction in overall cost was not even one of the lesser effects.

North Yorkshire Council Reorganisation 2023

‘A single new council for everyone in North Yorkshire’ will launch on 1 April 2023. It will cover District Councils, in Harrogate, Skipton/Craven, Richmondshire,  Ryedale, Selby District  and Scarborough. Surprise, surprise it will exclude York City Council which will still be run by the Vikings.

The new council reports it will ‘retain a main office in each former district supported by around 30 additional local customer access points.’ That’s modern economising for you. The foolish mandarins couldn’t have chosen a more suitable day to launch, April 1st. The changes to productivity may be even bigger than the current working from home initiative!)