Parish and Town councils submissions to the District Council electoral review

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Lichfield District

Personal Details:

Name: Samantha LaPlanche

E-mail: [email protected]

Postcode:

Organisation Name: Armitage with Parish Council

Comment text:

We, as a Parish Council are unhappy that our District Ward will be a District Ward shared with another Parish with different demographics. This will also stretch the workload of the 3 existing Councillors and feel that we will not be able to represent well and efficiently.

Uploaded Documents:

None Uploaded

https://consultation.lgbce.org.uk/node/print/informed-representation/3500 01/07/2014

Cooper, Mark

From: Fuller, Heather Sent: 21 July 2014 14:10 To: Cooper, Mark Subject: FW: Electoral Review of Lichfield: Draft Recommendations

From: HELEN ELLIOTT Sent: 21 July 2014 14:04 To: Reviews@ Subject: Fw: Electoral Review of Lichfield: Draft Recommendations

CLIFTON CAMPVILLE WITH PARISH COUNCIL Clerk: Helen Elliott

Dear Mr Cooper,

With reference to your letter dated 13th May 2014.

The draft recommendations for Council proposes Mease valley becoming a single member ward, which would include , , and Wigginton.

It is predicted that by 2019 this ward will have 6 percent more electors than average, which is within the stated limits of +\- 10 percent. We would have 1985 electors per councillor. This seems acceptable.

However, the Parish Council are aware of potential development within the Mease Valley. If 500 houses were built, this would probably be about an extra 1000 or so electors going into the Mease Valley. We would then have a huge number over the average number of electors per councillor.

Whilst the review seems to take into account other potential large developments. It seems to have ignored any development in the Mease Valley.

In summary the Parish Council has concerns that if in the future any development goes ahead then there could be over 1000 extra electors for this single member ward.

Yours sincerely

1

Helen Elliott Parish Clerk Clifton Campville with Thorpe Constantine Parish Council

2 Cooper, Mark

From: Fuller, Heather Sent: 18 June 2014 09:18 To: Cooper, Mark Subject: FW: Lichfield

From: Margaret Jones [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 17 June 2014 17:37 To: Reviews@ Subject: Lichfield

Dear Sirs

Elford Parish Council wishes to comment on the draft recommendations for Lichfield District Council as follows:

Although the Parish Council is in agreement with reducing the number of ward Councillors, it does not agree with being moved into the Whittington and ward. Traditionally Elford has had strong links with the Mease Valley and it wishes to remain part of this ward. It is part of a group of churches which share a rector and identity with Edingale, Harlaston, Clifton Campville and Thorpe Constantine. The existing two Councillors live in the Mease Valley and have a strong identity with it. Elford would prefer to be part of the Mease Valley Ward, even if the number of Councillors was reduced to one, as we have little contact with one of our Ward Councillors. The bus route which serves Elford travels from Tamworth via Wigginton, Edingale, Harlaston, Clifton Campville, so local people identify with this village network. All of these villages tend to travel to Tamworth for shopping more frequently than to Lichfield, as it is nearer, and served by better roads. Elford has few links with Whittington and none with Streethay.

Yours faithfully

Mrs M Jones Clerk to Elford Parish Council

1 Cooper, Mark

From: Fuller, Heather Sent: 23 June 2014 14:20 To: Cooper, Mark Subject: FW:

From: clerk [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 21 June 2014 21:32 To: Reviews@ Subject: hammerwich

The Parish Council for Hammerwich is unhappy at being linked with Wall Parish. Historically Wall has much more in common with Shenstone than Hammerwich and Cllrs would like to see wards that are co-terminus with district boundaries ie Pool Ward will be reabsorbed into Hammerwich Parish.

Regards

Viv Evans Clerk

1 Cooper, Mark

From: Egan, Helen Sent: 11 July 2014 09:20 To: Cooper, Mark Subject: FW: Consultation on boundary changes in Lichfield District

Hi Mark,

Please see sub below for Lichfield.

Regards, Helen

From: Ian Colclough Sent: 11 July 2014 09:13 To: Reviews@ Subject: Consultation on boundary changes in Lichfield District

Dear Sirs,

I email on behalf of my two , namely and Curborough with Elmhurst. Both appear to be affected by your proposal to alter ward boundaries in the area. My Councillors are concerned that you are aware of the implications on these two rural parishes. Your proposal would imply that they are included in a ward with Longdon which also includes Armitage / Handsacre. The latter is in effect a predominantly urban area. I am sure you will be aware that there are many issues unique to rural areas that do not apply to an urban area.

Perhaps when you make your final decision on the boundaries you will kindly bear this fact in mind.

We look forward to hearing from you in the near future.

Please would you acknowledge this email

Thank you Regards

-- Ian Colclough Clerk to the Parishes

(Mon to Fri 9am to 5pm)

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2 Lichfield City Council City Council Offices, Donegal House, Bore Street, Lichfield, WS13 6LU Town Clerk: Peter Young, B.A.

Switchboard: (01543) 250011 The Review Officer (Lichfield) Local Government Boundary Commission for England Fax: (01543) 258441 Layden House Email: 76-86 Turnmill Street London Ask For: EC1M 5LG

23 July 2014

Dear Sirs

Lichfield District Review – Draft warding proposals

At its meeting on 22 July, Lichfield City Coun cil gave further conside ration to the LGBCE’s draft warding arrangements. I t noted that the LGBCE was proposing 6 district wa rds for the City area with the same names as currently but with amend ed ward boundaries. It also noted that Lichfield District Council in its agreed response will not be requesting any amendment to those ward boundaries within the city area.

Lichfield City Council a ccepts those proposed 6 district wards for the city area. However, in doing so it would wish to strongly re-emph asise the statements made in o ur earlier submissions, namely th at the city and district ward boundaries should be coter minous. It therefore asks that the LGBCE in its final reco mmendations also appli es these sa me 6 ward boundaries to the City Council. It would ask tha t this is done by mathematically allocating the current 28 members to the new w ards so as to provide t he most eq ual electoral balance. Using the 2019 electoral projections, we calculate that this would produce the following:

Lichfield City Council Total 6 wards (same as for LDC) City Stowe St. John's

28 LCC members Boley Park Chadsmead Curborough Leomansley

2019 Projected Electorate 3,681 3,631 3,568 5 ,572 5 ,739 5 ,364 27,555 Number of LCC members 4 4 4 5 6 5 28 Electors per LCC member 920 908 892 1,114 957 1,073 984 % variation from LCC average -6.5% -7.8% -9.4% 13.2% -2.8% 9.0% 0.0%

F:\__FILES\COUNCIL\ELECTORAL\LDC Review 2013\LGBCE LCC response 23-07-14.doc

We believe that this p roposal is much simpler, is far more workable and pract ical, an d provides a much better electoral b alance than LGBCE’s c urrent 9 ward proposal f or the City Council. That proposal would have wards with different boundaries to the district wards, have wards ranging from 1 t o 6 me mbers and size r anging from 299 to 5,739 electors; and would have extre me electoral imbalance ranging from - 70% to +21% from the average. Further reasons wh y we object to the LG BCE’s nine-ward proposal were se t out in our previous submission of 3 July, 2014.

I would be grateful if t hese representations are taken int o consideration and imple mented in the LGBCE’s final recommendations.

Yours faithfully,

Peter Young Town Clerk Lichfield City Council City Council Offices, Donegal House, Bore Street, Lichfield, WS13 6LU Town Clerk: Peter Young, B.A.

Switchboard: (01543) 250011 The Review Officer (Lichfield) Fax: (01543) 258441 Local Government Boundary Commission for England Layden House Email: 76-86 Turnmill Street London Ask For: EC1M 5LG

3 July 2014

Dear Sirs

Lichfield District Review – Draft warding proposals

At its meeting on 24 June, Lichfie ld City Cou ncil con sidered the LGBCE’s draft warding arrangements, and in particular the proposed revised wards for the City Council.

In its earlier submission to LGBCE the City Council requested a reduction in its membership and that its wards boundaries should be coterminous with those of the district wards.

In response , the draft proposals by LGBCE are that the City Council’s overall membership remain at 28, and that the current 6 City Council wards are replaced with 9 wards, o nly one of which would be coter minous with a district ward. The size of the n ew City Co uncil wards would vary enormously from under 300 ele ctors to over 5, 500 elector s, and the number of members per ward would range from 1 to 6. There would also be hug e electoral imbalances, with the ratio of elector s per City Council member varyin g between -70% to +21% from the City Council average.

The City Council considers such electoral arrangements to be totally unacceptable.

Under the LGBCE proposal, the detailed breakdown per ward would be as follows:

Letter on Plan > H I J K L M N O P

LGBCE Draft for CITY Total 9 Wards City Stowe 28 members Burton Old Rd St. John's Pentire Rd Garrick Rd Boley Park Boley Park Chadsmead Chadsmead Curborough Leomansley Leomansley 2019 Electorate 3,152 955 3,332 3,568 299 5,572 529 5,739 4,409 27,555 No. LCC members 3 1 4 3 1 5 1 6 4 28 Electors per member 1,051 955 833 1,189 299 1,114 529 957 1,102 984 % variation from LCC ave. 7% -3% -15% 21% -70% 13% -46% -3% 12% 0%

F:\__FILES\COUNCIL\ELECTORAL\LDC Review 2013\LGBCE LCC response 03-07-14.doc

KEY: Blue lines: parish boundary. Green lines: current district and city ward boundaries (coterminous) Red lines: proposed district ward boundaries in the city Yellow lines: proposed city ward boundaries

When determining district electoral arrangements the LGBCE has three main considerations – equalising t he number of elector s each coun cillor represents; refle cting community identity; and providing for effective and convenient local government. There is no su ch lega l requirement for parish electoral arrangements but the City Council believes that this should be achieved as far as is possible, and is concerned that the LGBCE’s draft proposals for the City Council come nowhere near meeting these three ‘golden’ criteria:  In respect o f ‘equalising the nu mber of electors each councillor represe nts’, the ele ctor to member rati o for city councillors w ould va ry hugely from 70% over-represented to 21% under-represented. Such huge var iations cannot be sound or justified. If the City wards were amended to be coterminous with the 6 proposed D istrict wards for the Cit y, then (even without amending the overall number of city members) an electoral balance could be achieved where the hig hest variation was 13% in one ward, with all the other wards within +/-10%

 In respect of ‘reflecting commu nity’ the th ree new single-membe r wards have no geographic rationale other than that they are the parts of county electoral divisions moved from one district ward to another. It seems totally pointless to create 3 new single-member wards at parish level (one with just 299 electors and 70% over-represented) just so as not to cross County electoral divisio ns. County elections are held two years ap art from district/parish elections so there would be no conflict in pra ctice. But having different sets of ward boundaries for the city and district elections (which are held on the same d ay) will be highly confusing.

 In respect of ‘providing for effe ctive a nd convenient local govern ment’ it will b e administratively very difficult to run parallel district/parish election s when there are 9 city wards and 6 district w ards in the city, and this is a lso likely to be confusing for the electorate. Moreo ver, the St John’s ward, with 6 city members, could (in the present political climate) have a ballot paper where electors vote for 6 out of 24 or more candidates, which is also likely to be very confusing.

The City Co uncil would also challenge the LGBCE’s interpr etation that the overall number of parish members cannot be altered because this is never a ‘direct consequence’ of a district review. Altering the total number of members of a parish council is sp ecifically provided for under Section 56 of th e 2009 ‘Lo cal Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act’ and the Government would not have includ ed such a p rovision if it could never be used. We note th at parish electoral matt ers can be reviewed under a Co mmunity Governance Review, but the timing of the current LGBCE review means that no CGR can tak e place before the next electio ns in May 2 015, so in p ractice the huge inequ alities of th e LGBCE’s draft proposals would (if adopted in their current form) be subjected on our 27,000 electors for at least the next four years.

The City Council will make further representations prior to 28 July, once we know whether the District Council is supporting or objecting to the proposed district ward boundaries within th e city area. In the meantime I would be gratef ul if you could note the above representations, and in particular the need for the City and District ward boundaries to be coterminous.

Yours faithfully,

Peter Young Town Clerk Cooper, Mark

From: [email protected] Sent: 25 July 2014 14:12 To: Reviews@ Subject: FW: Shenstone Parish Council's Approved Response to the LGBCE recommendations - Date sent Friday 25th July 2014 Attachments: Local Government Boundary Commission for England Response from Shenstone Parish Council re Electoral review of Lichfield 25th July 2014.pdf

Importance: High

From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 25 July 2014 13:24 To: [email protected] Subject: Shenstone Parish Council's Approved Response to the LGBCE recommendations - Date sent Friday 25th July 2014 Importance: High

Friday 25th July 2014 13.22 FAO Local Government Boundary Commission for England

Please find attached the official response from Shenstone Parish Council to the Local Government Boundary Commission electoral review of Lichfield. Please confirm receipt of this correspondence. A copy of the Parish Council response will also be sent by registered post directly to LGBC at Layden House today.

If you require any further assistance please do not hesitate to contact the undersigned.

Sue Nelson – Parish Clerk Shenstone Parish Council Office 25C Main Street SHENSTONE WS14 OLZ

Tel: 01543 481 947 e‐mail: admin@shenstone‐staffs.gov.uk

1

PARISH COUNCIL OF WALL Chairman: Mr M J Crowe Clerk: Mrs C Dillow

Email: [email protected]

25th July 2014 Local Government Boundary Commission for England Layden House 76-86 Turnmill Street London EC1M 5LG Dear Sirs,

Wall parish council are concerned with the proposed recommendations from the Boundary commission for the area covered by this elected body and herby submits its statement of objection in respect of its affects on the parish ward. Wall is a small close knit rural village in including the hamlets of Chesterfield, Hilton, Muckley Corner (part) and Pipe Hill (part) with it’s own individuality dating back to Roman Times, which the remains of part are still present to this day, along with a small museum. Wall has a long standing and close relationship with the Parish of Shenstone and its wards, both as neighbours and sharing the same District Member representation, following consultation and discussions between members and officers from all three tiers of Local authority it should be noted that neither parish wants to lose that association. The LGBCE’s recommendation to join Wall with Hammerwich adds confusion that it crosses Parliamentary Boundaries, Wall being in Tamworth and Hammerwich in Lichfield and this conflicts with the Commissions own advice. The Parish Council’s view is that the two communities of Wall and Hammerwich share neither commonalities nor community infrastructure and the Council believes that LGBCE’s proposals to merge these two distinct communities together is neither in the interests of the communities themselves nor the District Ward councillors in achieving fair and proportionate representation of the two communities.

Wall has been recognised as a Neighbourhood Planning Area and is now in the stages of consultation based on the existing boundaries, this would be compromised and have a significant affect on the progress of the Government funded Neighbourhood Plans already proceeding should Wall be merged with Hammerwich. The Community of Wall request the Boundary Commission revisit Lichfield District Council’s proposals for our area which conform to the expectations of the Commission’s requirements to create an enlarged Lichfield District Council Ward of Wall with Stonall. We concur that the village community status we have in common with Stonall makes us appropriate partners to share district representation rather than Wall becoming a distant partner of Hammerwich which is largely an urban related area.

Thus meaning two rural communities are kept together and the unsuitable amalgamation of the largely urban area of Hammerwich and rural Wall can be eluded.

Conclusion: Wall Parish Council and its consulted electorate firmly believe that there is no justification in Wall becoming allied with Hammerwich and this could lead to a total imbalanced representation. There are numerous established links shared with Shenstone Parish Council which includes Stonnall in the form of Post Office, Shops, public transport and others, there is also a natural common boundary line in the form of the A461 Walsall to Lichfield road running alongside both Parish boundaries.

Number of Number of Electorate - electors per Variance from Ward name councillors 2019 councillor average % Little Aston 2 3,870 1,935 3% Stonnall & Wall 1 2,001 2,001 6% Shenstone 1 1,890 1,999 0% Total Number of councillors / electorate 4 7,761 1,940 3%

Yours faithfully

Mrs C Dillow Clerk and Responsible Finance Officer.