• Money

The central mystery, so far as I’m concerned at least, is that although we’re the sixth richest country in the world by GDP, all the money seems to have disappeared. Many would claim that GDP isn’t a great way of measuring wealth: for example, it regards services as being equal in value to manufacturing, it pays no heed to inequality and it equally ignores any societal or environmental considerations. None the less, it’s what we have. Also, it provides a comparable set of the figures, with all the assumptions that go with that: I’m richer than you and therefore, the logic might run, a more valuable member of society and probably a better person as well.

However rich we really are, we’re probably not as rich as we think. We are, perhaps, the equivalent of a family living on largely inherited income and which doesn’t produce very much and with colossal and mounting expenses – think of aristocrats with rather unprofitable land whose ancestral home needs the entire roof replacing.

That’s kind of where we are. The things that people of my generation grew up expecting to be here for ever and in comparative abundance – social security, the NHS, decent pensions, social care, well-funded schools, plentiful social housing and a friendly copper on every corner – are, without exception, now gone. All of these have become almost exponentially expensive.

There seem to be three reasons for this. All stem from changes that, on the face of it, seem to be good news.

• The first is that we tend to be living longer. Unfortunately, health and social care after about 75 becomes very complex and expensive as a number of conditions tend to collide.
• The second is societal change (some would say disintegration) which started in the 1960s. This has led to a more diverse society in every sense which the previously simple and one-size-fits-all approach (which didn’t work for everyone, but for enough) is unable to address.
• The third is legislation. For often laudable motives, governments have tweaked the existing systems in response to changing demands and needs. Some have demonstrated the law of unintended consequences. A good example is the SEND system, access to which was increased by Michael Gove a decade ago but is now a horrendous disconnect of funding shortfalls, parental expectations and available staffing: and which is only kept functional by a remarkable government sleight of hand which has made the costs, for the moment, hang in a limbo between its balance sheet and those of the local councils.

Reform UK might claim that it is facing up to this grim reality in the way that other parties are not. However I would never cast my vote for anyone who didn’t see wealth inequalities, social injustice and environmental degradation as evils that need to be addressed: which, as far as I’m aware, this party does not.

I do not know how this contradiction between what we have got used to having and what we can afford to pay for can be solved. I only know that it’s there and it’s foolish to pretend that it isn’t. We’re like the aristos mentioned above who can’t accept the decline of our once glorious mansion, and instead of working out how to fix it, spend our time moving buckets around in the attic.

• Elections

One change of direction which has to be regarded as a particularly inept U-turn concerns the council elections.

The issue here results from another laudable reform, that of reforming the structure of local government. One of the three planks of this, and by far the most important, is doing away with the two-tier system in places such as Oxfordshire. This would be a good thing.

Unfortunately, the government added to this, two other aspirations (larger unitary councils and the creation of mayoral/strategic authorities). This was, as I predicted, too much to accomplish at one bite: and so it seems to have proved. The wrangles, desperate courtships and attempted land-grabs that this has produced are identical to what would have happened were a head teacher to tell all the year 8s that some classes were going to be merged or otherwise made larger and they could suggest their own teachers and seating plans.

I don’t blame any of the councils for their reactions, many of which have been very rational – and it wasn’t as if they didn’t have other things to worry about. The upshot was, however, that in thirty areas the government decided that elections this year would be postponed (not all councils have elections at the same time or for the same number of members). The logic was that there was no point in holding expensive elections for authorities which might not exist a year later.

Cue outrage. Reform UK, ever ready to harness outrage wherever it can be found, launched a judicial review. This reaction must have been predicted by Number Ten. As the BBC reports, part of the reason both for the delay and the review may be found in the fact that Labour “currently controls 21 of the 30 English councils where elections were due to be delayed, and opinion polls suggest it may have been difficult to keep hold of all of them.”

(This is despite the fact that, as Private Eye 1669 reminds us on p 13, Robert Jenrick, one of the new jewels in Reform’s crown, postponed three elections in 2021 when a minister under Boris Johnson, as these would “be hard to justify where members would be elected to serve shortened terms.” He, of course, has served a shortened term as a member of the party for which he was elected in 2024.)

Before the matter came to court, the government was forced to retreat and say that the elections would go ahead after all. The BBC further commented that “the PM’s advisers correctly predicted that Nigel Farage would paint their reversal as a victory for him.”

That’s led to a fresh problem, with some of these councils claiming that they face a “race against time” to prepare for elections on 7 May. If there any procedural problems, the government will be blamed. For any Labour losses (and there are likely to be plenty) the government will be blamed as well. Reform and the Greens – an odd alliance of interests – probably stand to gain the most.

• Gates

No, this isn’t about the founder of Microsoft or the suffix of a scandal but a little tale that might divert you from all these awful observations for a few moments.

In our garden, we have a five-bar gate that opens onto the road. It was probably put in when the house was built in the early 1980s. It’s only occasionally needed for the delivery of things like logs or the removal of the cuttings whenever the beech hedge on either side of it needs hacking back.

About ten years ago, it became clear that it couldn’t any longer easily be opened, so sunken had the posts become and so rough the ground over which it needed to pass. About four years ago, it became clear that it couldn’t any longer be opened at all except by lifting it off its hinges when access was needed. About a year ago it became clear that it could no longer be properly put back on its hinges as everything had twisted out of shape. It became a kind of parody of a gate, wedged shut on one side by being sort of mounted on one hinge and, on the other, by being rammed into the ivy that was overgrowing the beech hedge.

On Sunday, a brief inspection prior to a possible rare opening this week made me realise that the situation was critical. After years of denial, it needed to be replaced. The following day, I called up Valley Fencing in Great Shefford to say we needed a quote for a new one.

Just as I hung up, I heard a strange boomy crash. I didn’t think too much of this at the time as there’s a house being built up the road and one of our neighbours was having some trees trimmed. It was only a couple of hours later when I drove past it on my way to the pool that I realised that this was the sound of the gate collapsing.

You can believe this was a co-incidence if you wish. I believe, as clearly as if the gate had afterwards told me, that it had heard the phone conversation and said “finally, thank God, I can have a lie down.” It’s still is lying down, although what we’re going to do with it is another matter.

To some extent, this links back to what I said earlier about the UK generally. Through inattention and denial, we ignored the fact that the gate had not only lost functionality but was turning into a cross between an eyesore and a health and safety hazard. Replacing it now will probably cost a lot more than it would have done when it was first clear it was necessary.

This is not the only thing in our house or garden that could be so described. With all due respect, I suggest that the same might apply to aspects of yours…

• Solar

“As Trump retreats from climate goals, China is becoming a green superpower,” this headline in a BBC article declaims. The piece goes on to say that Carbon Brief claims China’s CO2 emissions have been flat or falling for nearly two years and that “Beijing finds itself in an unexpected position: at the helm of a renewables revolution.”

In 2010, the article contends, China had enough solar-farm capacity to power about 100,000 homes. In 2018, it had enough to power all the dwellings in the UK, France and Italy. This is planned to increase about four-fold by the end of this year. The country makes more solar panels than the rest of the world combined. There are, of course, concerns that this is destroying communities, changing lives and causing future problems. That doesn’t bother Xi too much. China über alles is his motto.

As with so much from this country, the statistics are eye-watering. Liberal democracies – if the USA can still be so described – can’t compete with this: just as Russia would never have defeated Germany in WW2 if Stalin had had to justify every decision to parliament. Do the ends justify the means in an emergency? Apart from this war, and the pandemic – which was a wonderful dress rehearsal for dealing with the far larger problem of climate change – we’ve not had to make such compromises to our way of life. In China it seems to come up all the time.

Of course, there’ll be consequences. Solar panels may, like faxes, only be an intermediate technology. However, are the possible future problems worth it if we can wean ourselves off a diminishing and provenly dangerous fossil fuels? Somehow, I have confidence that China might be able to solve the problem of re-purposing millions of solar panels in twenty years’ time. I have no such confidence in the USA’s position which seems to consist in turning the dial back to some point in the 1950s.

• And finally…

• The fall-out for the Prince formerly known as Prince and Mandelson formerly known as Lord (or soon to be that way) continues: and also for others. The Epstein papers are causing a major flurry in the chicken coop of the world’s plutocrats, socialites, racketeers and sex maniacs. No bad thing, probably. But will it make any difference? Probably not to most of them. They can all afford good lawyers. Tough it out for a bit, might be the advice, and before you know it some other scandal will break, hopefully affecting someone else.

• Or perhaps retribution will hit you more quickly than even the best lawyers can advise. “Prince” Andrew turned 66 today. However, before he could tuck into his celebratory breakfast (a thick upper-crust Margherita with extra sweaty cheese specially ordered from Pizza Express in Woking), he was arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office. Trump said that “it was a shame.” What would mummy have said? 

• Possibly these documents may in time encompass and ensnare those responsible for the unfolding horror stories elsewhere in the world, including in Ukraine, Gaza and Iran: and many other places. However, even if so, many of them have long passed beyond shame.

• The Guardian reports here on legal proceedings brought against various social-media companies on the grounds that they were addictive to children. As any parent will know, they clearly are: the problems are (a) proving this in court and (b) deciding what can be done about it. The cat is out of the bag. Even if these were all closed down overnight we’d all now know what we were missing and, as was shown in Animal Farm, another version would emerge and produce similar results.

• The Cricket T20 World Cup is well under way and has produced some startling statistics. So far, the highest individual score has been by a Canadian. The best bowling figures are by someone from the USA’s team. Italy took part and didn’t finish bottom of their group. Australia – and here’s the best bit – has been eliminated. The prospect of a USA v Italy final in the future can’t be ruled out. All very welcome. It’s cricket, Jim, but not as we know it…

Across the area

• A fourth way

West Berkshire Council (WBC), along with so many others, is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. In WBC’s case, a series of possible outcomes (including emergency funding, SEND costs being largely written off, some solution to the adult social-care funding crisis, Ridgeway Council being green-lighted and, if it is, the ability of the new authority to retain all the reserves of the Vale and South Oxfordshire) have been plotted as a route out of the problem. This may work.

WBC has chosen the first option, based on the assumptions summarised in the first paragraph. Anything that avoids cutting non-statutory services seems reasonable. Critics might claim it’s like betting the house on a coin coming up heads six times in a row.

As with a business that’s facing financial pressures, there are three options: borrow more and hope; spend less; or go bust (which, in municipal terms, means issuing a Section 114 notice).

I’ve spoken to one councillor from another authority which has been into a S114, and to someone who’s been in touch with others. The results of an S114 aren’t great. The commissars come down from Whitehall and rule the place according to financial, and not societal, needs. All non-statutory services – which range from most libraries to community transport and from sport to culture – are vulnerable. There is also an attrition of local democracy which risks making all the national disputes about delayed elections beside the point.

A fourth way exists, however. This is for the upper-tier councils to enter into a frank discussion with their towns and parishes about the true peril which these services face. The key point here is that, while council tax rises are capped, parishes can raise their precept by as much as they want. This total will end up as a line on your council tax bill.

This would by-pass the restriction on council tax and provide revenue which could be used, if the parishes agreed, to continue to fund such services. This could be done either by buying them for the parent authority or doing them themselves. It could also result in parishes taking over assets previously owned by the parent authority, as Hungerford has done with such success with the Library.

There are drawbacks. There would be a post-code lottery where parishes whose councils were unwilling to make the case for increases or take on these new responsibilities would have fewer dog bins, verge cuts and access to community transport. There would be problems with supply of these services and inefficiencies in their costs. Small parishes would find all this far more difficult than would larger ones.

There would also be huge advantages. If the story were sold correctly, residents would understand that these services had to be paid for somehow and that this way would give more local control. Parish and town councils – which, as the pandemic showed, are capable of great energies and resourcefulness  – would gain more self-confidence and importance and so would encourage more people to join them.

It would also create a real devolution of power, and in a way that would, unlike the proposed mayoral authorities, cost the government nothing, require the creation of no new bodies and formalise the direct involvement of hundreds of thousand of people in the issues that their communities faced.

The real advantage, though, would be to insulate us all from the impacts of a S114 notice. If your council went this way tomorrow and the commissars turned up next week, there’s be nothing you could do to stop all these services from vanishing. How much better would it be to say “we’ve already worked out what services we want and agreed how to pay for them – commissars, you  can cut what you want from the parent authority but we’re raising the money ourselves.”

All this takes time and I haven’t seen any signs anywhere of this opportunity being taken. For this financial year, most parish budgets having been set,it may be too late. Some have reserves they can draw on until 2027-28 comes around.

Of course, by then, the government may put a cap of precept increases claiming that these are against the interest of hard-working British families. However, the last time I checked, this idea of increasing local accountability hadn’t been tried. Perhaps it might be worth changing the relationship in this way and seeing if it could be made to work. The present system seems to admit of no such hope.

• A fraught meeting

WBC’s Executive met on 12 February to consider the problem of its budget for 2026-27. A recording of the meeting can be seen by clicking on the link. It was a slightly testy affair but there were also some reasonable points made by members, mainly to do with ambiguities or seeming errors in the figures. I’ve asked the two opposition leaders if they feel that their concerns have since been adequately addressed in the meeting and await their comments.

The meeting was also notable for a suggestion about a possible conflict of interest, speakers finding themselves muted, threats of room clearance, an unexpected ten-minute recess and a walk-out of four of the members. These issues have been covered elsewhere. I can only hope that any disputes, procedural or personal, have been discussed and resolved between the participants. I can’t see that much can at this stage be accomplished by my going over them here.

Those who missed this discussion will have a chance to see the same matter aired at the budget meeting of the Council on 26 February. It’s possible that by then the government will have announced whether it’s prepared to grant WBC the requested level of exceptional financial support. If it doesn’t, there may need to be a hasty re-drafting of some of the figures. Either way the opposition members will be keen to have their say.

Hopefully on this occasion the meeting will restrict itself to the dire financial situation and that there will be the same number of members in the chamber at the end as there were at the start.

• Funding sources

Despite these financial storm clouds, WBC and other councils are continuing to spend money. Three of the many schemes which have recently been announced are the refurbishment of Chestnut Walk in Hungerford (£1.1m), a 3G pitch at Faraday Road in Newbury (£1.25m) and a Community Wellbeing find (£110,000). People may well ask – indeed, one has asked me – why such projects can be even considered.

The answer is that councils have several different funding sources and many of them are only for specific kinds of expenditure. In general, CIL must be spent on infrastructure; S106 on the projects specified in the agreement; the social-care precept on (guess what) social care; and capital receipts on other capital investments or on “transformation” expenditure, which seems to be something that will save money in the future: though how much money and by when in the future is less clear.

There’s also the funding that councils receive from government to be spent on often specific initiatives which Whitehall wants to encourage. These may also need to be spent in a certain period of time. Sometimes these are dished out to all while on other occasions there’s a bidding process.

Particularly in these times, authorities need to be very clear about where the funding is coming from. There’s a benefit to them in this. If the funding is ring-fenced for a particular purpose then there’s no point in people complaining that it should have gone on something else. If it’s come from the authority’s general day-to-day income, however, then such questions are worth asking.

In the case of the three above examples, WBC hasn’t done itself any favours in the way it’s specified these.

Faraday Road was first announced to be being funded by borrowing, then by “external funding” and then by CIL. Chestnut Walk is described in two contemporaneous and mutually contradictory documents as being paid for (a) by S106 and (b) by CIL, external grants and reserves. As for the Community Fund (which is the one about which I received the question), the funding source of this was not specified at all, leaving open the possibility that it was a piece of municipal frittering.

I asked the portfolio holder about the last point and it appears that it isn’t. The funds come from the public-health grant that WBC receives which are ring-fenced for this purpose. The option of using these for SEND, social care, community transport, salaries, office parties or anything else doesn’t arise. The only matter that does is the far narrower question of whether, within these restraints, this was the best use of the money.

Hopefully in future all councils will accompany statements about funding initiatives with clear and accurate information about where the money’s come from. That way we can all know what might be worth looking at a bit more closely. Any confusion in the way the funding sources are expressed could be taken by residents to mean that the Council itself is confused, or that there’s some intention to mislead. I hope and believe that neither is the case here. However, such public perceptions of a council are not particularly helpful, particularly at the moment.

• Community Champions

Congratulations to all the winners and nominees for the most recent round of these annual West Berkshire awards, the results of which have recently been announced

“The Community Champion Awards are always a fantastic event,” WBC’s Chair Tony Vickers said. “We were thrilled to receive so many different nominations and the panel found it incredibly challenging to choose the winners. Thank you to everyone who made a nomination and those who were nominated.”

You can click here to see WBC’s report, including details of the winning and highly commended nominees.

• Ask the Leader

West Berkshire Council Leader Jeff Brooks is going live to answer your questions in the next Ask the Leader event streamed across YouTube, Facebook and LinkedIn for up to an hour from 6pm on Wednesday 11 March.

You can send your questions in advance by emailing: asktheleader@westberks.gov.uk before 4pm on Wednesday 4 March. You can also ask questions during the event using the comment feature on your chosen platform. You’ll be able to view the scheduled livestream and set a reminder on your preferred platform a few days before the event. More information can be found here.

• News from your local councils