Council Leader Phil Bialyk said he was disappointed with the pause in Local Government Reorganisation but said he understands the government’s need to review the decisions made.

https://news.exeter.gov.uk

Communities Secretary Angela Rayner announced in Parliament that Devon is one of 14 areas nationally which will be reviewed and paused.

The government confirmed local elections in May 2027 would go ahead on existing council boundaries, meaning Exeter City Council elections will be held as usual in May 2027.

The Communities Secretary told MPs that in light of legal advice, she must be satisfied that the right process is in place, that it is robust, and complies with the law.

She also said that she wanted to fully test whether the proposals for local government reorganisation meet the priorities of the new administration and new prime minister.

Cllr Bialyk said: “I’m disappointed that Exeter’s long wait for unitary status will now be delayed while this review takes place.

“But I understand that there needs to a review because the new prime minister and new administration need to be satisfied that the decisions made are the right ones and that the right processes were followed.

“It is very important that we get this right, because it is too good an opportunity to miss for Exeter and for the rest of Devon.

“Local Government Reorganisation is the biggest change for Exeter for more than 50 years, and we have no doubt that our joint submission with Plymouth for change in Devon – which was supported by the government – remains the right one for all residents and communities in the county.”

In July the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government approved the joint proposal by Exeter and Plymouth city councils to create four new unitary authorities for the county.

The new unitary councils approved were:

An expanded Exeter – Exeter plus 49 surrounding parishes from Teignbridge, East Devon and Mid Devon

An expanded Plymouth – Plymouth plus 13 parishes from South Hams

An expanded Torbay – Torbay plus 21 nearby parishes

Devon Coast and Countryside – a new council designed for rural and coastal communities

The Government’s announcement to review the reorganisation of local government has received cross-party support from Devon County Council.

www.devon.gov.uk

Devon County Council Leader Julian Brazil welcomed the decision to pause the plans to create four unitary councils across Devon as “great news” while others said the decision provided “hope”.

The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government Angela Rayner MP told Parliament this afternoon that the decision follows legal advice. She said that effective local government is the foundation of the Government’s devolution plans. The intention of the review is to ensure the process was robust and that reorganisation meets the priorities of new Prime Minster Andy Burnham.

Councillor Julian Brazil, Leader of the Council, said:

“This is good news for the people of Devon. We now seem to have a Prime Minister who listens and this is a mature decision by the Government. We can work with a Government that listens.

“There’s no doubt LGR has been costly, but it has been the catalyst to deliver reforms to streamline local government, and we’re working well with district councils on that. We have said all along that you need to let us do it our way. We are best placed to deliver that.

“If the government wants a strong economy, you can’t mess up local government which is one of the building blocks to achieve that. We need a mayoral system to deliver a strong economy.”

Councillor Michael Fife Cook, Leader of the opposition at Devon County Council, said:

“The older you get, the more you end up cherishing messages of sanity and hope. The rethinking on LGR is not just for my generation to be thankful, future generations will come to realise, you don’t throw away a whole system for a few faults, we now have the opportunity to try harder for the future of Devon, and not to waste £80 million on rebranding and reinventing the wheel. This has been a good day for us all.”

In the announcement in Parliament today Angela Rayner MP, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, said the Government is committed to reorganisation but working “with local people”.

She said: “The Prime Minister told the House last week, he was ‘prepared to look at local government reorganisation’ and he asked me as his Communities Secretary to ‘do that’.

“In that context, in light of legal advice, I want to satisfy myself firstly that the right process is in place, that it is robust, and of course complies with the law. And secondly, I want to fully test whether our proposals for local government reorganisation meet the priorities of a new administration and a new Prime Minister.”

The Government also withdrew local government reorganisation decisions made in March for Essex, Hampshire, Norfolk and Suffolk.

It was confirmed that local elections will go ahead in May 2027 on existing council boundaries.

news.eastdevon.gov.uk

East Devon District Council supports the Government’s decision to pause and review the Local Government Reorganisation programme, including proposals affecting Devon, Plymouth and Torbay.

The council welcomes the opportunity for Government to ensure that any future decisions are based on robust evidence, sound governance arrangements and long-term sustainability for local communities.

East Devon District Council has consistently maintained that Local Government Reorganisation should deliver better outcomes for residents, protect frontline services and provide a strong foundation for future devolution across Devon.

In July 2026, the government selected a proposal for four new unitary councils in Devon and East Devon has been working extensively with the ten other local authorities in Devon to support new arrangements to begin from 1st April 2028. The latest statement from the Secretary of State will pause this work until clarity is provided by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.  

Councillor Paul Arnott, Leader of East Devon District Council, said: 

“We welcome the Government’s decision to review the Local Government Reorganisation programme and to ensure that any future proposals are both legally robust and aligned with the Government’s wider ambitions for devolution.  

East Devon members from all political parties sent a letter to the Secretary of State in August this year to request a review of the decision made for Devon, and we are pleased to see that the Government is listening to the concerns of local councils.  

Throughout this process, East Devon District Council has been clear that the test of any reorganisation proposal must be whether it delivers better services for residents, stronger financial resilience and greater local accountability. 

The scale and complexity of local government reform means it is essential that decisions are driven by evidence rather than arbitrary geography or politics. However, significant work is happening across councils in Devon to deliver on already tight timelines; any review should happen quickly and decisively to avoid delay and reduce ambiguity for staff and residents.  

In the meantime, our focus remains on delivering excellent local services and supporting the people and places of East Devon.”  

Question Martin Wrigley (Newton Abbot) (LD)

12. For what reason the local government reorganisation model in Devon was selected. (901193)

Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government 

(Angela Rayner)

I have asked the Minister for Local Government, Devolution and Regional Growth, my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton (Jim McMahon) to undertake a rapid review of the local government reorganisation programme. I have withdrawn the decisions made in March this year for four areas: Essex, Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock; Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Portsmouth and Southampton; Norfolk; and Suffolk. The review will look at the programme as a whole, including the decision that was taken for Devon, Plymouth and Torbay.

Martin Wrigley

I congratulate the Secretary of State on her return to her place in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. I welcome her team, too. I thank her for her upcoming statement and the review that she has just started, which address my question and that of my colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for South Devon (Caroline Voaden), about the Devon local government reorganisation, which had been described as bonkers. Next time around, will the Government include the local MPs in the process? Will the local councils be refunded the costs incurred this time around?

Angela Rayner

I hope that local MPs and councils will be engaged. I have made a commitment, which I will go into further in the statement after this Question Time. It is about making sure that we make the right choices for local areas. Where costs have been incurred, there will be conversations with my Department, which was allocated money to support local government reorganisation. We are still committed to local government reorganisation, but with people.

Paul Arnott LibDem deputy leader of Devon County Council and leader of East Devon District Council, said he welcomed the decision and said credit should go to Prime Minister Andy Burnham for having the “good judgment and humility” to pause and review the plans.

Miles Davis www.bbc.co.uk

The government had previously adopted the plans put forward by Labour councils in Plymouth and Exeter to expand the urban areas.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said in a statement it was launching the review to ensure the plan was “robust and aligns with new government priorities”.

Paul Arnott, Liberal Democrat deputy leader of Devon County Council and leader of East Devon District Council, welcomed the decision but said the project had already cost millions of pounds.

He said: “At both county and district levels, at least 30% of officer capacity has been redirected to work on local government reorganisation – that is multiple millions of pounds.”

Arnott said he welcomed the decision and said credit should go to Prime Minister Andy Burnham for having the “good judgment and humility” to pause and review the plans.

He said: “However, the district councils and the county council have been left with an enormous bill for this.”

Plans for local government reorganisation were originally launched in 2024 and elections were due to take place across Devon in May 2027 with the new authorities in place from April 2028.

The BBC has tried to contact the Labour leaders of Plymouth and Exeter and the Conservative leader of Torbay for comment.

Government support for rural upper tier local authorities

Westminster Hall debate 2 September

To illustrate the mess the Government is in regarding local government reorganisation here is a quote from Terry Jermy MP Labour, South West Norfolk, in reply to Richard Foord, during the debate reported below:

“I am sure the Minister heard the hon. Gentleman’s point about local government reorganisation, but I will not comment on it. I can barely understand Norfolk’s proposals, let alone Devon’s.”

[Norfolk council is controlled by Reform and has issued a request for a judicial review.]

Devon MPs challenge government over rural council funding

Lewis Clarke www.midweekherald.co.uk

A council funding shake-up has triggered warnings that rural communities could be left paying more for fewer services while a major reorganisation risks creating an authority too large and too weak to thrive.

Three MPs with Devon constituencies used a Westminster Hall debate to challenge the government over the cost of delivering services across sparsely populated areas and the impact of proposed local government changes.

South Devon MP Caroline Voaden, Honiton and Sidmouth MP Richard Foord and Tiverton and Minehead MP Rachel Gilmour all raised concerns about the future of rural services and the financial strength of any new authority covering large parts of the county.

The debate on Wednesday, September 2, focused on government support for rural upper-tier local authorities and heard repeated arguments that countryside councils face higher costs because residents, schools and services are spread over much greater distances.

Ms Voaden said the rural-urban divide was one of the deepest in the country and that deprivation was too often hidden in areas that outwardly appeared prosperous.

She told MPs that people in rural areas often faced lower wages, seasonal work, longer journeys and poorer public transport, while access to healthcare, banking and post offices had also declined.

She said: “I have since come to realise that the rural-urban divide is possibly one of the deepest divides in our country and one that is too often overlooked.”

Ms Voaden added that high house prices and second homes had intensified the affordability crisis, saying Devon’s full-time salary-to-house-price ratio stood at 10.6:1 compared with an England average of 8.7:1.

Her criticism then turned to the 2026-27 to 2028-29 local government finance settlement.

She said the withdrawal of the rural services delivery grant had cost councils in Devon about £14 million and argued that rural authorities had not benefited from replacement funding in the same way.

She said the government’s funding approach failed to reflect the extra cost of providing services across a large, sparsely populated county.

Ms Voaden also linked the funding dispute directly to local government reorganisation in Devon.

She criticised the government’s chosen proposal for four unitary authorities, under which Plymouth and Exeter would expand, a further urban growth area would be centred on Torbay and a fourth authority would cover much of rural Devon.

She said that remaining authority would stretch around 70 miles from Ilfracombe to Salcombe, or about 100 miles by road, while lacking a major town capable of driving growth and regeneration.

Ms Voaden told MPs: “The Prime Minister talked yesterday about supporting rural areas and not creating a two-tier country, but the Government have created a two-tier Devon.”

She urged ministers to reconsider the reorganisation and look again at alternative options, arguing that the selected proposal prioritised growth in Plymouth and Exeter over the “economic and social cohesion of rural Devon”.

Ms Gilmour backed those concerns.

Her Tiverton and Minehead constituency crosses the Devon-Somerset border, and she told the debate that the Devon part alone covered around 800 square miles.

She said: “The part of my constituency in Devon is 800 square miles and will form just part of an enormous rural authority.”

Ms Gilmour then asked whether such an authority would have the “fiscal power to sustain itself”, a concern Ms Voaden said she shared.

Mr Foord raised a separate warning over Devon’s road network and the effect of separating Exeter from the wider county.

He told MPs: “Devon has to maintain over 8,000 miles of road, which is the most of any upper-tier authority in the country.”

He questioned whether partitioning Exeter from what he called the “rural Devon hinterland” would remove part of Devon County Council’s tax base and weaken its ability to support other services and economic growth.

The government defended its wider funding formula.

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government Jim McMahon said the fair funding review was intended to distribute resources according to assessed need while recognising differences in council tax and business rates income.

He said nine in ten councils would receive funding that broadly matched their assessed relative need by the end of the multi-year settlement.

Mr McMahon also rejected claims that the system ignored rural costs.

He said an area cost adjustment was applied across funding formulas and took account of factors including wages, property costs and journey times.

A separate remoteness adjustment was also used for adult social care.

He acknowledged the argument that rurality affects other services, including children’s services and waste collection, but said there was a balance between making the formula more detailed and keeping it simple, transparent and predictable.

Ms Voaden challenged him directly over the loss of the rural services delivery grant.

She said: “The Minister says there is an area cost adjustment, and yet the leader of Devon county council says that Devon lost £14 million because of the rural services delivery grant, which was removed. How can those two things be true?”

Mr McMahon replied that the government had “always taken the view” that the rural services delivery grant had a “weak evidence base”.

He said the fair funding review was instead based on the best available data.

The minister also pointed to £4.6 billion of additional adult social care funding in 2028-29 compared with 2025-26 and almost £3 billion over four years for the families first partnership programme.

He said the government had also set out £4 billion over three years for reform of special educational needs and disabilities services.

Local authorities with high-needs deficits would receive grants covering 90% of those deficits, subject to approval of local reform plans.

Mr McMahon said the government had recognised pressure from home-to-school transport in rural areas by introducing a formula based partly on pupil numbers and travel distances.

Following consultation, he said the maximum distance used in that formula had been increased from 20 miles to 50 miles.

On devolution, Mr McMahon said areas would not be shut out simply because they were not yet ready for a mayoral model, but added that local consent and partnerships would be needed.

A council funding shake-up has triggered warnings that rural communities could be left paying more for fewer services while a major reorganisation risks creating an authority too large and too weak to thrive.

PM is prepared to look again at reorganisation but wants to hear from the Communities Secretary.

From a correspondent:

Dear Owl, 

I read with interest Andy Burnham replying to Conservative MP for South West Devon, Rebecca Smith, on the proposed Devon devolution that:  

“I am prepared to look at local government reorganisation – I’ll ask the communities secretary to do that.” 

“Where possible we need as much consent as we can get – if she’s telling me we need to work harder to find that then I’m always prepared to do what I can.”

We must all, therefore, e-mail/write to Andy and Angela Rayner asking them to reconsider LGR in Devon.

The proposed urban centric devolution plan, opposed during consultation by 70% and only favoured by 20%, leaves around half a million Devonians in an administratively unmanageable rural rump. 

This rump will become the largest unitary area in the country with the lowest density of people, with one of the oldest population groups and one of the largest networks of roads to maintain, 8,000miles.  

It will be one of the only unitary authorities in the country without a dominant administrative centre. Barnstaple in the north is the biggest town. Currently the NHS has suspended all hospital maternity services in Barnstaple because “recruitment had proved challenging over the past few years, due to it being one of the most remote in the country.” 

The rump will only have 103 councillors for 360,000 electors, set against the “three urban centres” with 218 councillors for 586,250. A rural councillor will have to represent 30% more electors. 

Please if you feel as strongly as I do, let Andy and Angie know.

Easiest way is to use the departmental online comments. As we are not constituents we cannot use their parliamentary emails.

For Andy Burnham use:

https://contact.no10.gov.uk/ comment here is limited to 1,000 characters.

For Angela Rayner, Communities Secretary, use: 

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/contact-the-ministry-of-housing-communities-and-local-government

Thank you

The prime minister has suggested he may reconsider some aspects of the massive changes to local government that are being introduced in Devon.

Miles Davis Devon political reporter www.bbc.co.uk

Andy Burnham was responding in parliament to a question from Conservative MP for South West Devon, Rebecca Smith, who said constituents were “devastated” by what the changes might mean.

All of the district, county and unitary authorities in Devon are being abolished to make way for four new unitary authorities based on expansions of Plymouth, Exeter and Torbay, and a council for the rest of Devon.

Smith has worked with Liberal Democrat MP for South Devon, Caroline Voaden, on petitions against the proposals which have gathered more than 6,000 signatures.

Rebecca Smith, MP for South West Devon, put a question to the PM about local government reorganisation

Speaking in parliament on Tuesday, Smith highlighted the size of the proposed Devon Council, with 103 councillors, set against the “three urban centres” with 220 councillors.

Referring to Burnham’s repeated promise of economic improvement across the country, Smith asked the PM: “How can that version of local government reorganisation produce growth in every postcode?

“I urge him to revisit that decision with the minister responsible because quite frankly, constituents across rural Devon are devastated by what it might mean for them.”

In response, Burnham said: “I am prepared to look at local government reorganisation – I’ll ask the communities secretary to do that.

“Where possible we need as much consent as we can get – if she’s telling me we need to work harder to find that then I’m always prepared to do what I can.”

Plymouth, Torbay and Exeter will all expand under the plans for reorganisation

The plans adopted by the government for the expansion of the urban areas in Devon were those put forward by Labour-led councils in Exeter and Plymouth.

The new authority for the rest of the county will stretch from Lynton in the north to Salcombe in the south and from Holsworthy in the west to Seaton in the east.

Smith and Voaden say residents are concerned about “communities being divided, the future delivery of vital services, democratic representation, council tax and the financial viability of the proposed authority”.

In petitions calling on the government to reverse its decision, which are being presented on Wednesday, Smith has gathered more than 4,200 signatures and Voaden has gathered almost 2,000 signatures.

Voaden said: “It is patently clear a rural authority at the scale of the proposed Devon Council, with a road network comparable in size to Luxembourg, won’t be able to deliver services effectively or affordably.”

Georgina Allen westcountryvoices.co.uk

I have now spent some time trying to suppress my urge to call this piece ‘How a small group of people managed to persuade the government to sacrifice the wildlife, farmland, communities and the most vulnerable in Devon to further their own interests.’  Obviously, that’s overly histrionic, possibly inaccurate and definitely not helpful, but it does highlight what I and many others are thinking about the government’s decision to push Devon into this urban-centric devolution deal.

Why are so many people unhappy about it?

Firstly, it seems to me that people are questioning the need for it.  Why are we, the people of Devon, being asked to find approximately £80m to fund a scheme that diminishes our democratic representation, increases our council tax (hopefully in the short term), hands over vast swathes of countryside to city councils, breaks communities and splits towns like Dartmouth and Totnes apart. 

When district councils were first told about Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) a couple of years ago, they were asked to come up with viable plans. At South Hams, we didn’t like the idea – we would be scrapped for a start, but the plans that the district councils eventually came up with made some sort of sense.  Devon is a difficult county to organise, but the 4,5,1 plan that all the district councils signed up to at least meant that every rural area had a major urban centre attached, that services could be managed and that there was a sustainable way forward.  What we have now basically means that the cities have cherry picked the countryside they want to grow into and abandoned the rest. 

People are also not happy about being either pushed in with a city council, possibly to be built up into a suburb, or being effectively abandoned to the green wasteland in the middle.  The danger to villages and communities dragged into the Greater cities is real.  Labour councillors from both Plymouth and Exeter have stated that they are particularly pleased with the deal because they feel that their cities ‘have been constrained by tight boundaries, set decades ago, which stop them from building the homes they need’. (taken from a letter sent to the minister responsible, Steve Reed, by leaders of the three city councils). 

This ‘homes they need’ line, which for quite a while has meant ‘homes we want to build to keep the economy going’, might well mean, in Exeter’s case, their defunct Greater Exeter Plan, which was vetoed a while ago by East Devon District Council because of the negative effect it would have on their district.  If Exeter has really pushed this entire debacle on us all because they were thwarted in their expansionist aims earlier, then that is really quite shocking.  I’ve learnt to distrust any close connection between politics and housebuilding, to be honest.

At least in the city areas, there should be a continuation of services and usable infrastructure.  The great leftover rump in the middle is what we should all be very worried about. It will become the largest unitary area in the country with the lowest density of people, with one of the oldest population groups and one of the largest network of roads to maintain.  It will be one of the only unitary authorities in the country without a dominant administrative centre, we will have lost our economic hubs, all three of them and will face severe budgetary challenges. 

‘It’s alright, Jack’ for those in Labour-run Plymouth with its MOD contracts, or Exeter with its science park, but abandoning the rest of us to struggle and suffer is irresponsible in the extreme.  The one phrase you hear over and over again, is that Government just doesn’t care: its not interested in the countryside (or all the people who live in it, it seems). What about adult care in rural areas, which by default costs more than it does in the cities? What about education, housing, healthcare? How will planning work?  You ask these questions, but the response back from council leaders who have been asking the same questions of ministers, is that they don’t know because the government just doesn’t seem to care. 

What, then, is the point of all this?  It appears that the government is following a city-led economic recovery agenda and that a lot of that recovery seems focused on their insane 1.5 million house building target.  No better way to embrace that, it seems, than by removing any remaining restraints on those eager-to-build folk in the rural cities, and to look the other way at the effects it has on the population, on the environment and, of course, on some of the most beautiful landscapes in Britain. 

We don’t vote Labour in round here, so are, in a way, expendable…or at least, if I was cynical, I might think that.  Destroying so much countryside, or should I say potentially destroying so much countryside, doesn’t really fit in with their supposed environmental credentials, but as approval for the Rosebank oilfield appears to be going through, it looks as though that ship might have already sailed.

There are so many questions to which we don’t have answers. Where will the council be based? What will happen to town and parish councils? How many councillors will there be?  Will there be local hubs?  Where will our funding come from?  Why is it happening? 

We do seem to be in the same boat as several other counties, who seem just as cross as we are; but after all, we are just a bunch of nimby old country folk, easily ignored.  Actually, on reflection I think my original comment was probably correct – we are all just being sacrificed on the altar of housebuilding and for the benefit of a few folk in Plymouth and Exeter. A plague on both their houses, quite frankly.

Georgina Allen is a Green Party councillor for South Hams Totnes ward and founder of the “South Devon Watch” a one time contemporary blog to EDW

“The yeast that lifts the whole mattress of dough, the magic sauce, the ketchup of catch-up”. (BoJo 2021)

Burnham says the government is central to his ‘triple helix’ plan for growth

Maurício Alencar www.cityam.com/

Andy Burnham has said politicians are central to his “theory of growth” in his first statement in the House of Commons as Prime Minister. 

Addressing MPs from all parties, Burnham said his ideas for the UK economy centres on a “triple helix approach to economic development” in which universities, businesses and the government foster economic growth. The ‘triple helix’ model was first drawn up in the 1990s by economic theorists Henry Etzkowitz and Loet Leydesdorff.

He told MPs that devolution provides a “clear answer to the question with which this country has long wrestled” on who drives growth. 

“My theory of growth requires it to be driven with the full authority of the very centre of government, in close partnership with His Majesty’s Treasury,” Burnham said. 

“Number 10 North has been set up with that full focus.”

He said the “triple helix approach” would “build a pro-business culture and an innovation-led economy in all parts of the UK”. 

[Sounds to Owl very much like the mix of talent deployed in the ineffectual and discarded Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs). Is it just coincidence that Andy Burnham and Vince Cable (architect of LEPs) attended the same Cambridge college?]

Quadruple/Quintuple Helix – the missing sauces

Note:  Newer versions of the theory add civil society and the natural environment to the framework. Maybe Andy Burnham needs to update his system, or were these omissions deliberate?

South West Water is doing more harm to the environment than any other water company in England, according to new analysis, with more sewage discharged in Devon, Cornwall, Dorset and Somerset than anywhere else.

It’s bad even when It’s dry and worse when it has been raining. – Owl

Pippa Neill www.theguardian.com

Friends of the Earth analysed water companies’ environmental performance in six categories: sewage spills, water quality at bathing sites, pollution incidents or warnings at bathing sites, severity of sewage pollution at bathing sites, the percentage of rivers rated below the standard for good ecological health, and the affordability of bills.

South West Water, which operates across Devon, Cornwall and parts of Dorset and Somerset, was among the top three worst performers in four out of the six categories.

The water company had the highest total duration of sewage spill events since 2024, averaging 574,323 hours annually. Severn Trent and Yorkshire Water came second and third respectively but were outstripped by South West Water, by almost 200,000 spill hours.

South West Water’s designated bathing sites also recorded the most pollution incidents and warnings, with 666 recorded in 2025 alone.

There are 157 official bathing sites in South West Water’s catchment. If a site is designated, the Environment Agency will monitor water quality during the bathing season to protect people’s health.

A spokesperson for the company said: “We manage more than a third of England’s designated bathing waters, so improving water quality is a huge priority for us. We’re already seeing progress, with storm overflow spills down 17% and spill duration down 25% over the past year, despite significantly higher rainfall across the region. We’re also on track to meet new Environment Act bathing water standards by 2030, five years ahead of the national deadline, showing the impact of record investment across the south-west.”

Alongside this poor environmental performance, Friends of the Earth said South West Water’s roughly 1.8 million customers faced some of the highest water bills at £726 annually. Since 2024, they have had the second biggest increase in England, with bills rising by 39%.

Southern Water is responsible for the most expensive water bills in England and the biggest increase since 2024, with £281 added to the average bill in that period.

Kierra Box, a water campaigner at Friends of the Earth, is calling on the government to bring forward a robust clean water bill that sets out a “meaningful plan for restoring the health of the UK’s rivers and seas”.

She said: “People have had enough of hearing ministers say they’ll fix the problem, only to bring in measures that superficially address the issue. If we’re to end the sewage scandal once and for all, we must see the government committing to a complete overhaul of our water system.”

A Defra spokesperson said: “It is totally unacceptable that some water companies are failing to deliver value for money for customers and polluting our rivers, lakes and seas.

“The government recognises that we need to build on our reforms which banned bonuses so our water system works for the public. That’s why we are driving forward the biggest overhaul of the water sector in a generation, with new legislation to give the public more control and help keep bills as low as possible.”

Friends of the Earth is also calling on the government to nationalise water companies. Sources recently told the Guardian that the prime minister, Andy Burnham, was considering ripping up insolvency laws to make it easier to bring key utilities such as water companies under public control. However, the Times reported that Burnham had shelved plans to put Thames Water into administration amid concerns about the cost and the legal risk involved.

Defra said Thames Water remained financially stable, but the government stood “ready for all eventualities, including applying for a special administration regime if that were to become necessary”.

A Water UK spokesperson said: “No sewage spill is ever acceptable, and we are working to end them as fast as we physically can. That’s why we are tripling investment over the next five years to halve spills from storm overflows and upgrade the capacity of 1,700 wastewater treatment works.”

Updated 28 August to include final paragraphs missed out.

This is the same government that instructed councils to present new warding and voting arrangements for their unitary councils in three weeks; a process that would normally take twelve to eighteen months and be done by the Boundary Commission.

Apparently reorganisation is now all about “place” putting people in councils they can relate to, not so much about cost savings.

All happy with that? – Owl

Government ‘hasn’t listened’ to Devon over controversial LGR plans

DCC Leader Julian Brazil

Council got a letter from the government’s legal department. All to do with the challenge around Local Government Reorganisation (LGR.) The council had issued a ‘Pre-Action Protocol Letter for Judicial Review’ and Government was meant to reply by 17th August.

Their letter now says they won’t be able to respond until 4th September. They’ve also refused to answer the Freedom of Information (FoIs) requests saying it would take too much time and resources.

This same government that instructed us to present new warding and voting arrangements for their unitary councils in three weeks; a process that would normally take twelve to eighteen months and be done by the Boundary Commission. You couldn’t make it up; double standards or what!

In Devon we’re going through reorganisation of local government, the police, fire brigade and the NHS. For local government alone there are more than four thousand tasks to be completed. However, when government is asked to explain their rationale behind their reorganisation decisions it’s all too complicated for them.

What hope have we got when government, with all those resources, can’t explain the decisions but we’re expected to pick up the pieces; paid for by Devon’s council taxpayers of course. When is a civil servant going to summon up the courage and tell ministers they’ve bitten off more than they can chew; the emperor not wearing any clothes springs to mind. Then again, they might actually believe it’s being done in the right way, but if so, why can’t they answer the FoIs or the pre-action letter.

How have we got into this mess? I genuinely don’t have a problem with the idea of LGR, and I can see the benefits, but it’s got to be done right. Perhaps if they’d asked local government experts, like the people who actually run local government, to work out how to do it, that might have helped. Instead, we are left in the hands of expensive consultants and clueless Whitehall civil servants. With the final decision left with a Secretary of State who was promptly dismissed for not being in the new Prime Minister’ tribe. Residents deserve better.

We were led to believe LGR was all about delivering better services, more efficiently for our local communities. Instead, in Devon, we are left with a chaotic fiasco that smacks of political interference. Government is now claiming it’s all about ‘place.’ Might cost more and services will be less efficient and effective, but people will be in councils they relate to. Really? With towns split and historic communities divided, it’s no surprise the majority of Devon is unhappy. The idea Exeter and Plymouth have been constrained within their boundaries just doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. You can see with your own eyes thousands of new houses being built.

The frustrating thing is the county, working with the districts, was beginning to make the changes the government professed to want.

Options for services that would work better at a larger and uniform scale like rubbish collection and leisure, were being explored. Children’s services are beginning to improve; extra money is being invested in our road network.

Why couldn’t Westminster set some parameters and then just leave it to us to deliver, but they’re not interested and haven’t listened.

They obviously had their own agenda and it’s nothing to do with what’s best for Devon.

We don’t want to have this legal fight, but if the new prime minister won’t change his government’s tack, bring it on.

“Alongside my colleagues, every councillor and every member of the public I have spoken to, I am struggling with this whole process – the upheaval, the rush, the cost, and some of the poorly thought-through decisions from Government.”

Cllr. Denise Bickley

Last week, Devon County Council’s Cabinet considered the proposed warding arrangements for the new unitary authorities as part of the Government’s plans for Local Government Reorganisation (LGR).

Alongside my colleagues, every councillor and every member of the public I have spoken to, I am struggling with this whole process – the upheaval, the rush, the cost, and some of the poorly thought-through decisions from Government.

I am not against LGR in principle.

There may be benefits to doing things differently.

But it needs to be carefully planned and designed around the communities it is intended to serve.

I simply do not believe this process is allowing enough time for that.

The proposed warding arrangements are a good example.

Here in Sidmouth, the proposal would divide our area between Sidmouth Town, with one unitary councillor, and Sidmouth Rural, Sidbury and Newton Poppleford and Harpford, with three unitary councillors.

That is four unitary councillors covering an area which currently has one Devon County Councillor alongside seven East Devon District Councillors.

Newton Poppleford and Harpford currently fall within a different County Council division, represented by Cllr Jess Bailey.

So the proposals change not just the number of councillors, but the communities being represented together.

Good local government is not simply about drawing lines on a map.

It is about whether boundaries make sense to residents, reflect established communities and provide effective local representation.

But for me, there is an even more important issue: we must not allow LGR to disrupt the progress we are making for Devon’s children and families.

The last 15 months have allowed me to get deeply involved in assisting the transformation of our services in SEND.

I am confident that, in an incredibly difficult national picture, we are making positive progress according to all our performance indicators and the Department for Education advisers we work closely with.

But that progress is not yet fully embedded.

Could I say every parent is feeling the difference yet?

Of course not.

SEND is complex, involving education, health, social care and other services, and sustainably changing outcomes takes time and enormous group effort.

I refer back to the report of the Government’s own Children’s Commissioner, Nigel Richardson, who warned that breaking up Devon’s existing children’s services arrangements could risk stopping improvement in its tracks, or even reversing progress.

That could hardly be clearer.

We must not allow arbitrary administrative boundaries to get in the way of positive outcomes for children.

I believe there could be benefits from reorganising local government – but only if we do it properly.

Instead, we are being asked to proceed at extraordinary speed, whether or not we believe the Government’s plan will deliver the positive outcomes it expects.

We have no realistic option but to engage with the process.

But that does not mean we have to back it blindly when we fear it is dangerous.

Cabinet therefore decided to note, but not endorse, the response on the interim warding arrangements, because of the democratic deficit we believe these proposals create.

We thanked officers across all Devon’s current councils for the huge amount of work they have undertaken under immense pressure and within ridiculous timescales.

Whatever happens with LGR, we must protect the progress being made in Children’s Services, protect and nurture the relationships that are strengthening, and make sure organisational change does not come at the expense of our children, families, and communities.

Listed alphabetically. Source.

Listed alphabetically, grouped according to current District affiliation (East Devon in bold at the bottom).

Source

South West Water’s storm overflows were reported as discharging for 299 hours, or 1.8 weeks.

(Cllr. Ed Tyldesley LibDem County Councillor for Chulmleigh and Landkey writes 24 August on facebook)

That is 664 separate spill events across 184 sites, despite just 16.5mm of rain across the South West. For context, a normal August week receives between 15 and 25mm of rainfall – so last week was bang on average.

South West Water have already told me that their live monitoring data can sometimes contain false readings and that individual activations need to be investigated.

Well, investigate them then!

Because we are now left with two possibilities:

Either South West Water’s own data is correct, and sewage was discharged into our rivers and seas for 299 hours in a single week.

Or their legally mandated monitoring system is so unreliable that hundreds of apparent sewage spills are being reported to the public which may not actually have happened.

Neither is remotely acceptable.

If the monitors are wrong, fix the monitors.

If the discharges are real, fix the sewage network.

What South West Water cannot keep doing is publishing these extraordinary figures and then shrugging their shoulders when people ask what happened.

I have been back and forth with Pennon Group this past week and have been stonewalled at every turn. When I ask for an explanation, they ask which spill I’m specifically asking about whilst missing the point – I’m concerned about every spill!

In North Devon alone, WaterWatch recorded 50 spill events across 27 sites, including discharges into the Little Dart and River Mole.

We pay some of the highest water bills in the country. We should not have to choose between a sewage system that cannot cope and a monitoring system we cannot trust. Based on last year’s figures, South West Water will have made roughly £2.4 million in profit last week.

Enough excuses. Enough dividends. Enough bonuses.

Put the money into the infrastructure.

Fix the leaks.

Fix the sewage works.

And stop treating our rivers like a toilet – Read on there is much more below the image – Owl

A week ago Cllr Tyldesley wrote:

Another week, another round of environmental vandalism..

·No rain, but 200 hours of sewage discharge!

Over the last week, the South West has received almost no rain. But South West Water saw their storm overflow systems activated for a total of 206 hours!

The data below has kindly been provided by WaterWatch and shows that even though there was no reason, the SW region saw 353 activations of their storm overflow systems. It beggars belief how they can even call it a “storm” overflow system when it is used even in the driest weeks in record.

Last week we saw 106 hours after just 3.5mm of rain, people were horrified and wanted answers. I’ve had a response from SWW:

“WaterFit Live provides near real time data for all our storm overflows, this shows whether the overflow is active and for how long. This information helps customers and stakeholders understand how the wastewater network is operating and supports greater transparency around storm overflows. We are required to provide data in near real time, and we are currently not able to validate this before it is published. This means occasional false readings can be published. These false readings may occur due to factors such as leaves, twigs, bubbles, or foam. These can all trigger an Event Duration Monitor (EDM) and indicate an overflow is operating when it is not. A full validation is undertaken on a monthly basis, and the data is amended to reflect these false readings.”

I wrote back to express my dissatisfaction that I’d just been sent a stock response and received the following:

“Storm overflows may activate for a number of reasons and therefore each activation needs to be investigated on a case-by-case basis and as such I am unable to provide you with a definitive answer to your question.

However, should there be specific activations that are of concern please come back to me and I will be happy to investigate. It is also worth noting that we review the data from our EDMs and publish our first assured data on our website monthly in arrears. In addition, we are required to produce a further regulatory return on a calendar year basis which is submitted to the Environment Agency. This calendar year return goes through a further quality assurance check before being published on gov.uk on the link below.”

I am concerned with every single one of these activations!

To be blunt, it is not our problem if the legally-mandated monitoring data contains some false readings. The public have a right to trust the data and if SWW think there are inaccuracies then they need to spend some of their hundreds of millions of pounds of annual profit improving their reporting system. As far as I’m concerned, these numbers are accurate and should be treated exactly as they appear – South West Water have dumped raw sewage into our rivers for 206 hours in the driest week of the year.

Fix your leaks. Fix your reporting system. Stop paying out massive dividends and executive bonuses. Stop putting our bills up. And stop destroying our natural environment for your profit. 

Owl asks: WHAT HAS SIMON JUPP*  EVER DONE  FOR US (with apologies to the BBC)

* Former MP for East Devon now Director of Corporate Affairs for the Pennon Group, owner of South West Water

The new warding arrangements have been released for “Greater Exeter”.

Looks to Owl as if Exeter Leader Cllr. Phil Bialyk has overplayed his hand, being too greedy in his land grab.

Despite Exeter keeping all its wards and councillors, parity rules mean Exeter councillors will be outnumbered 36 to 50 by councillors from old Devon Districts and likely to be led from outside the city walls.

Here is the map of the new warding arrangements:

The key take-away from all this is that Exeter has had to make no change, retaining all its 36 councillors and ward structure with three councillors per ward elected on a rotational basis. Indeed it looks as if the whole of the Devon carve up has been designed to satisfy Exeter.

The remaining 50 seats (to retain parity) will have to be divvied up between the 22 wards carved out of the surrounding districts, an average of two and a bit councillor each.

Are you ready for a hybrid electoral system?

Are we going to have a hybrid electoral system where:

Wards with three councillors elect one councillor in each of the three active years, with no election in the fourth (fallow) year. (Exeter) 

And the rest where:

Wards with two councillors elect one councillor in two of the active years.

Wards with one councillor elect their single representative in only one of the active years?

How is this going to work?

Owl doubts that it will pass muster with the electoral commission.

Details

From former Mid Devon

3 new wards

• Yeo
• Crediton Lawrence
• Crediton Boniface

From former Teignbridge

6 new wards

• Dawlish North East
• Dawlish South West
• Chudleigh
• Kenton & Starcross
• Kenn Valley
• Tedburn St Mary

From former East Devon

13 new wards

• Exe Valley
• Broadclyst
• Cranbrook
• Whimple & Rockbeare
• West Hill & Aylesbeare
• Clyst Valley
• Woodbury & Lympstone
• Budleigh & Raleigh
• Exmouth Brixington
• Exmouth Halsdon
• Exmouth Withycombe Raleigh
• Exmouth Town
• Exmouth Littleham

From former Exeter City – no change

12 Wards

• Exwick
• Duryard & St. James
• Pennsylvania
• Mincinglake & Whipton
• Pinhoe
• St. Loyes
• Heavitree
• Newtown & St. Leornard’s
• St. David’s
• St. Thomas
• Alphington
• Priory

Despite all this gerrymandering Exeter councillors will still be outnumbered 36 to 50 from the rest.

Local government reorganisation – Rural rump councillors to represent 60% more electors than their counterparts in Expanded Exeter.

Here are the stark numbers (Source)

Exeter

• Electors: 188,449
• Members: 86
• Ratio: 1:2,191 [Rounded 1:2,200]

Devon (Coast and Countryside)

• Electors: 359,906
• Members: 103
• Ratio: 1:3,494 [Rounded 1:3,500] i.e. 1,300 (or 60%) more electors than an Exeter councillor.

Whilst there are strict rules to retain parity between wards within a single authority, there are no rules governing the need for parity between separate authorities.  However, parity will still have to be maintained between parliamentary constituencies.

So one effect of creating unitary authorities is to enable the government to make major shifts in representation between rural and urban areas.

But is it fair?

Is this the real reason Andy Burnham only met Exeter Council Leader Cllr. Phil Bialyk on his “visit” to Devon? 

Special DCC meeting (LGR) cabinet

The government has required councils affected by reorganisation to respond by 17 August. (In a hurry during the holiday season.)

At a special meeting of the (LGR) cabinet convened by Devon County on 14 August:

The Leader MOVED the following motion which was duly SECONDED by Councillor Buczkowski;

            That Cabinet

(a) note, but due to the democratic deficit it creates, do not endorse the response to be submitted by Devon County Council to Government, by the 17th August 2026, regarding interim warding arrangements for the proposed successor authorities arising from Local Government Reorganisation in Devon, Plymouth and Torbay and Exeter; and

(b) that it be further noted that final decisions on councillor numbers, initial electoral arrangements and the content of the Structural Changes Order rest with the Secretary of State and Parliament.

The MOTION was put to the vote and declared CARRIED.

Footnote

Elsewhere Owl has written that it looks as if the whole of the Devon carve up has been done to satisfy Exeter.

The City  has had to make no changes to its wards or representation, retaining all its 36 councillors and ward structure with three councillors per ward elected on a rotational basis. Compared to Plymouth and the rest of Devon it has a generous allocation of councillors.

The result is not only inequity. This generosity has wiped out any chance of making savings by significant reductions in councillors.

Many Devon MPs have launched petitions and have pledged to raise the government’s decision on Local Government Reorganisation when parliament resumes in September. CPRE is urging those who oppose the government plan to write to Angela Rayner as well. – Owl

Devon “betrayed” by Local Government Reorganisation decision Devon CPRE, August e-bulletin

‘Gerrymandering’, ‘a stitch-up’, ‘betrayed’ and ‘shafted’ were just a few of the headline reactions to the government’s announcement of their preferred plan to reorganise our two-tier local government system into a single ‘unitary’ model.

The decision sent down from the Secretary of State on 16 July divides Devon into four Unitary Authorities: an expanded Plymouth, an expanded Exeter, an expanded Torbay and… the leftovers, quaintly titled ‘Devon Coast and Countryside’. This will be the largest single authority by area in England, and its biggest town will be Barnstaple.

The upshot is that 777,000 Devonians will live – and pay their Council Tax – in the three new metropolitan areas, while the remaining 455,00 will bear the financial responsibility for 2,500 square miles of rural and coastal Devon, a single authority that stretches from Lynton to Salcombe, and from Hartland to Axminster.

Plymouth will subsume 13 parishes currently in the South Hams, while Exeter will take 15 from Teignbridge, 28 from East Devon and six from Mid Devon. Torbay will expand its boundary to take on 22 parishes in total from Teignbridge District Council and South Hams.

As Devon County Council leader Cllr Julian Brazil put it:

“The sentiments sound fine. Devolution, democracy, efficiency. But the reality is everything we’re being forced to do will achieve exactly the opposite. Decisions will be taken further from the people, decided by distant, faceless officials, censored by an ever more controlling centre.” He described the plan as a ‘Labour stitch-up’ and estimated that it would add £250 a year to household bills – mainly Council Tax – in the vast new Coast & Countryside Authority.

In our own statement, we pointed out that there are areas of rural Devon which have some of the lowest incomes in the entire country. Livestock-grazing farmers, of which Devon has a preponderance because of our world-beating pastureland, have seen their average incomes drop to less than £23,000 in recent years.

We said: “This plan clearly demonstrates, yet again, that Westminster has no understanding whatever of what happens outside the cities, of the precarious economics of rural England in general and Devon in particular, and cares even less. Already they have summarily and suddenly turned off the agricultural subsidies that many Devonian farmers depend on, and hit them with Inheritance Tax on theoretically-valuable land that yields their families barely subsistence-level incomes.

“Devon depends heavily on landscape-based and coastal tourism – yet at the same time we’re a top target for the government’s new uses for our agricultural landscapes, like massive solar farms and now, it appears, gigantic data centres and containerised battery ‘parks’ on our fields. Just the sort of things that we’re already hearing are causing people to think twice about moving here, let alone coming here for their holidays. And the beneficiaries are huge corporate businesses and offshore investors, not the people whose land is being taken.”

We understand that Devon County Council is one of three that have decided to take the matter to a Judicial Review. In the meantime, we urge anyone who thinks that taking all of the conurbations, the vast majority of the industry and three fifths of the population out of Devon, leaving the remaining 40% of taxpayers to try and fund the largest authority in the country, is a terrible idea to write to:

The Rt Hon Angela Rayner, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, 2 Marsham Street, London SW1P 4DF.

Numbers matter – fill her mail box

Barnstaple staffing “challenging” because of its “remoteness”

“Senior managers of the NHS Trust explained that recruitment had proved challenging over the past few years, due to the hospital’s size and location – being one of the most remote in the country.“

Yet under current government devolution plans, Barnstaple will have to be the administrative centre for half a million Devonians living up to a two hour hard drive away in places like Kingsbridge, Sidmouth and Axminster. So how easy will this be to get off the ground by 2028? – Owl

27 July Notification of potential and temporary suspension of births at North Devon District Hospital

6 August Temporary suspension of births at North Devon District Hospital from Tuesday 11 August announced (Extract)

The Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust has confirmed that, despite extensive efforts to maintain services, births at North Devon District Hospital (NDDH) will be temporarily suspended from Tuesday 11 August 2026 due to unsafe levels of medical staffing.

7 August Cllr Jess Bailey, Chair of Devon Council Health and Adult Care Committee and Devon Leader Julian Brazil announce a special scrutiny meeting will be convened on Monday 17 August.  (Extract)

A number of subject matter experts will be invited to give evidence to the committee, whose role is to scrutinise public health and health services in Devon.

Committee chair Councillor Jess Bailey said:

“The staffing issues behind this closure have clearly been developing for some time, yet it was announced with little notice. We will seek assurance from the hospital trust that a robust plan is in place to ensure it is reopened as soon possible.

“The unit will have been closed for six days by the time the committee meets, so some of the impacts on families, the safety of new mums and the effectiveness of the trust’s mitigation plans should be understood by then.”

Council leader Councillor Julian Brazil said:

“Some remote parts of North Devon are a two-hour drive from Exeter – and that’s when there is no traffic or road closures.

“For a council which has put improving the lives of children and families as its top priority, this closure is extremely concerning. It is not a decision which would be countenanced in other parts of the country and we should not accept second-rate NHS provision here.”

11 August Maternity unit closes

Same day National Headlines: Doctors at remote Devon hospital get ‘crash course’ after maternity unit shut (Extract)

Doctors at one of England’s remotest hospitals have been given a “crash course” in birth emergencies after its maternity unit was shut and as fears grow that the safety of women and babies may be put at risk.

17 August Maternity unit closure ‘an absolute disgrace’, says Devon County Council leader. (Extract)

He was speaking at a special meeting of the scrutiny committee which was being held as a result of the suspension of services. The meeting was chaired by Cllr Jess Bailey and lasted four plus hours. Video here.

Councillors heard from senior management of the Health Trust for Exeter and North Devon who explained the decision was taken after a consultant left after a family bereavement, and a locum doctor also left.

The trust decided the remaining team of six was no longer a safe level to operate an effective roster.

Some councillors at the meeting were alarmed to hear that the service was so “fragile”, given it had taken the loss of two positions to create this situation.

Senior managers of the NHS Trust explained that recruitment had proved challenging over the past few years, due to the hospital’s size and location – being one of the most remote in the country.

But Councillor Ed Tyldesley pointed out that West Cumberland in Cumbria was a similar size hospital and was able to rotate staff more successfully with a neighbouring hospital in Carlisle.

18 August The medical director of an NHS trust that has suspended births at a maternity unit has resigned in protest over the decision. (Extract)

Dr Karen Davies said she was leaving her job at Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (RDUH) because she could not “support the way the trust has handled, and is handling, the maternity situation” at Barnstaple hospital.

Responding to Davies’ resignation, Vanessa Purday, chief medical officer at RDUH, said the trust “has a responsibility to make decisions based on clinical risk, patient safety and the available evidence”.

Purday added: “The decision to temporarily suspend birthing services was reached through established clinical, executive and system governance processes when safe staffing could no longer be assured.”

The trust’s chief medical officer said every available option was considered and the safety of women and their babies was the “overriding consideration”.

Davies wrote in her resignation letter: “We have known for several years that there have been concerns about fragility, as well as safety and culture, in the northern maternity unit.”

She said she was concerned a proposal for additional support which “could have produced a plan to avoid closure” was not brought in.

She added she had not taken the decision to bring her retirement forward lightly and several colleagues had asked her to stay.

“But ultimately I have to accept that my repeated warnings and concerns over the last two years have not been heard and have not been acted upon,” her letter said.

Where do we go from here?