Three councillors on Plymouth City Council have left the Labour Party, citing concerns over immigration policies, trans issues and cuts to the winter fuel allowance.

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

Dylan Tippetts, the city’s first openly trans councillor, was elected as Labour councillor for Compton in 2022 but has now become Plymouth City Council’s only Liberal Democrat member.

Zoe Reilly, who represents Honicknowle, quit Labour to become an independent while Carol Ney, the member for Southway, left Labour to join the Independent group.

The Labour leader in Plymouth said all three councillors should stand down so that by-elections could be held.

Tippetts said Labour had “thrown transgender people under the bus and has taken us back decades”.

Following a Supreme Court ruling that a woman was defined by biological sex under equalities law, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said he did not believe transgender women were women.

Announcing the political move, Tippetts said: “I will always make sure trans voices are listened to and valued in this period of turbulence and division our country faces.”

Welcoming Tippetts to the Lib Dems, city party chairman Stuart Bonar said: “With the government scrapping winter fuel payments to over 10 million pensioners, as well as cutting benefits to disabled people, it is no surprise that more and more people are turning to the Liberal Democrats.”

Carol Ney said she left the Labour Party because of her concerns over the government’s cuts to the winter fuel allowance and plans to change personal independence payments.

She said: “These changes are affecting the poorest members of society and I’ve heard first-hand from residents who are struggling to make ends meet.”

Ney said she had hoped to see a change of direction from Labour following the local elections in May.

There were no elections in Plymouth but Labour were wiped out on Devon County Council.

She said: “I was hoping after the recent election results Labour would have changed policies as they can see the electorate are becoming disillusioned with the party. Alas they have not listened to the general public.”

Zoe Reilly left the Labour Party the day after the prime minister made a speech about bringing down net migration.

She reportedly referred to Starmer’s speech and said, external remaining in Labour “would be a disservice to myself and to the diverse communities I continue to work with”.

Reilly has not responded to a request for comment from the BBC.

The defections mean Labour has 39 councillors on Plymouth City Council, the Conservatives and the Independent group both have seven councillors, the Green Party has two members, while the Liberal Democrats have one and one councillor is independent.

Tudor Evans, leader of the Labour group on Plymouth City Council, said it was “disappointing” when people left the party.

He said: “They should stand down in order for a by-election to be held, so the residents of those wards can choose whether they are happy with their councillors switching allegiance during their term of office.”

Evans said Labour had the highest number of councillors since it became a unitary authority and was “getting on with delivering its ambitious programme for the city”.

The press article below reports on the Government’s response to the proposed District Council carve-up. A mixture of faint praise and requests for further details especially on “efficiency savings”.

There appears to be no guidance on the Government’s preferred option from the range presented by Devon’s various local authorities. Even Plymouth’s bid to remain a unitary authority with expanded boundaries hasn’t been given a formal green light.

So what future is there in Labour Exeter’s go it alone bid?

One elephant in the room is that the government “expects that areas will be able to meet transition costs over time from existing budgets” even though the same services have to be delivered involving a massive staff reorganisation and relocation exercise.

Another, bigger one, is that funding on special educational needs and disabilities (Send) dominates the budget and is beyond all counties’ ability to pay, threatening them with bankruptcy. It is a problem the Government can’t turn a blind eye to for ever.

A separate press article discusses Plymouth’s bid to expand its unitary borders and Leader Cllr Tudor Evans’ offer to start talking with others.

Owl’s view is that Labour’s insensitive “efficiency” plans to eliminate historic county identities and impose Mayoral Authorities over areas similar in size to that of Police Commissioners will be a massive vote loser. It will be a running sore at the time of the next election.

So too will be the proposed planning reforms which will enable developers to bypass direct environmental safeguards by contributing to a restoration fund rather than directly mitigating damage. 

Some Labour MP’s are waking up to the folly of all this.

Difficult to see this all being sorted any time soon. Indeed, it might suit the Government to deploy “masterly inactivity”!

Hard work on Devon’s shake-up plans ‘clear to see’, Government says

Bradley Gerrard, local democracy reporter www.radioexe.co.uk 

The work by Devon’s councils on kickstarting the biggest local government shake-up in 50 years is “clear to see”, the ministry in charge of the overhaul says.

Bosses of Devon’s 11 existing councils have received a letter from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government about their response to Westminster’s request for the county to completely revamp how it is governed.

The 15-page letter, seen by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, recognised the efforts by each of the councils, but its repeated requests for “further information” suggest significant amounts of work will be needed by November’s deadline for final plans.

The letter provided amalgamated feedback on a range of interim plans, including those submitted by individual councils such as Plymouth, Exeter and Torbay, and one by seven of Devon’s eight districts.

The government wants to scrap the two-tier system that exists in 21 areas of England, including Devon, whereby county councils perform some service and district councils look after others.

Westminster wants larger unitary councils overseeing all services.

This will likely mean the abolition of all of Devon’s councils as they exist now, resulting in mergers to create unitary councils with populations of around 500,000 people. Although Plymouth City Council, which is already a unitary, wants to keep that status, with expanded boundaries.

“We recognise that plans are at an early stage and further analysis is planned in the run up to submitting the final proposal(s),” the letter from the ministry said.

“Further detail and evidence on the costs, efficiency savings and outcomes that are expected to be achieved would be welcomed.”

Devon’s councils highlighted a combined 20 ‘barriers and challenges’, and while some of these are answered by in the letter, many either require more information from councils or rely on announcements that the government hasn’t yet made.

Crucially on funding of potential new unitary councils, the letter said further details on funding reform proposals and transition measures would be “consulted on after the spending review in June”.

“Given the financial pressures you identify, it would be helpful to understand how efficiency savings have been considered alongside a sense of place and local identity,” the letter added.

“We recognise that the options outlined in the interim plans are subject to further development. In final proposal(s) it would be helpful to include a high-level financial assessment which covers transition costs and overall forecast operating costs of the new unitary councils.”

In terms of how councils will pay for the work they are doing to develop proposals for their mergers into larger, single councils, the government “expects that areas will be able to meet transition costs over time from existing budgets”.

The government has announced £7.6 million of funding for “ongoing analysis and testing of proposals”, but that will be split across the 21 areas.

And in terms of merging services, the ministry says it would “encourage you to consider partnership options for joint working across the new unitaries for the delivery of social care services”.

Perhaps concerningly, the ministry only “noted” Devon’s councils’ concerns about the potential impact on national park authorities, how local NHS funding could be altered, and the difficulties of serving the needs of Devon’s rural and coastal communities.

In relation to what is arguably one of Devon County Council’s biggest issues – its special educational needs and disabilities (Send) overspend – the letter said the government had provided a £1 billion funding increase nationally for the current financial year.

However, given the county council alone has a £131 million Send overspend – and there is thought to be roughly £6 billion of such overspend nationally – individual Devon councils will be keen to hear how this will be dealt with before they become part of a new larger council that could become liable for this red line in the budget.

At present, Send overspends can be kept to one side of councils’ balance sheets meaning it isn’t currently impacting annual budgets. But the so-called ‘statutory override’ that allows this runs out next March.

The letter added that it “welcomed plans” for Devon’s councils to work together on final proposals.

“Effective collaboration between all councils will be crucial; areas will need to build strong relationships and agree ways of working, including around effective data sharing,” it said.

“This will enable you to develop a robust shared evidence base to underpin final proposal(s).

“In particular, as for the final proposal(s), as each council can submit a single proposal that must be a clear single option and geography for the area as a whole.”
 

With Reform taking so many votes (and seats) from the local conservatives in the recent Devon County Council elections, Owl wonders whether “Currently Conservative” is how the rump of Tory Councillors might now be best described.

This thought was fuelled by a claim Owl received from a reliable friendly mole that a former East Devon District Councillor (EDDC), who had stepped down at the 2023 elections, has now defected and joined Reform. 

Owl understands that members of the Tory “Old Guard” in the Exmouth and Exeter East constituency are “incandescent”.  

Owl has studied the councillors’ declared affiliations following the Annual Meeting of EDDC. Currently there are no Reform members.

Do we need to watch this space?