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Assembly chairman bids to retain planning powers
THE new chairman of the South East England Regional Assembly has promised to try to block a government initiative to hand its planning-decision powers to an unelected body.
Conservative, Paul Carter, has promised to work with Labour but says he will oppose the Government's bid to transfer the assembly's planning powers to the South-East Development Agency.
Mr Carter said: "We have opposed the transfer of planning powers away from the leadership of elected councillors all along and will continue the fight to ensure any new regional arrangements have a strong democratic focus. In the meantime, there is much unfinished business, particularly the South-East Plan and regional transport capital allocation. It is important that the regional assembly provides a cohesive group that represents the South East on these important strategic issues and continues to have a constructive dialogue with government."
Seera has 112 members and includes elected councillors nominated by local authorities, businesses, healthcare organisations and other bodies.
Mr Carter replaces Keith Mitchell, who has stood down as chairman of the assembly.
7:47am Friday 22nd August 2008
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CommentPosted by: Clive, Romsey constituency on 10:06am Fri 22 Aug 08
I thought this regional assembly was unelected anyway. One barely hears about anything they do and handing it over to another body would make no difference. It just goes to show that democracy in this day in age is a sham. Whether it comes to our council tax, bin collections or whatever, the people don't have a say as decisions are made behind closed doors, preferably in the dark chambers of Brussels. I wish that we could go back to the old counties of pre-1974 where there were county boroughs and where local issues really were local. Successive governments, with their deadly tinkering of the system has toally destroyed all of this and the signing of the Lisbon treaty means that Britain, has effectively ceased to become a nation-state. This is the final step towards creating a "new world order" where resources are controlled by the World Bank and the Freemasons, NOT political parties or your local council!
I thought this regional assembly was unelected anyway. One barely hears about anything they do and handing it over to another body would make no difference. It just goes to show that democracy in this day in age is a sham. Whether it comes to our council tax, bin collections or whatever, the people don't have a say as decisions are made behind closed doors, preferably in the dark chambers of Brussels. I wish that we could go back to the old counties of pre-1974 where there were county boroughs and where local issues really were local. Successive governments, with their deadly tinkering of the system has toally destroyed all of this and the signing of the Lisbon treaty means that Britain, has effectively ceased to become a nation-state. This is the final step towards creating a "new world order" where resources are controlled by the World Bank and the Freemasons, NOT political parties or your local council!
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