Burnley Council to formally oppose Blackburn merger

Burnley Council will oppose any plans to merge the borough into a single East Lancashire all-purpose local authority including neighbouring Blackburn with Darwen.

It’s full budget meeting on Tuesday night approved a motion which made clear that it did not believe such a large unitary council as proposed in a government White Paper was ‘the right solution for our area’.

The councillors voted down a Labour amendment calling for a special Extraordinary Meeting of the authority before any reply was sent to the government expressing its views by March 31.

The Labour group also called for the immediate creation of a working group to shape the council’s response to the government’s plans for local government reorganisation linked to devolution of Whitehall powers and cash to a Lancashire combined county authority probably with an elected Mayor.

Burnley Council’s leader Cllr Afraisiab Anwar and its ruling Burnley Independent Group/Liberal Democrat executive will now meet on March 12 to consider its position on the proposed local government reorganisation in Lancashire to look at multiple options.

The approved motion said: “This council does not believe that the government’s White Paper delivers the right solution for our area.

“There are significant concerns about the arbitrary 500,000 minimum population threshold suggested for new unitary authorities.

“Creating such large unitary councils risks removing the local focus from local government.

“This council is also concerned by the pace at which the White Paper is being implemented.

“Burnley Council will engage with the reorganisation process to secure the best possible outcome for our residents and businesses.

“However, it will advocate for smaller, more locally accountable unitary authorities, and a minimum of two within East Lancashire.

“This council will oppose the centralisation of services to Blackburn and resist any proposal that would

merge the boroughs of Burnley and Blackburn together with other East Lancashire boroughs into a single unitary authority.”

Cllr Anwar told the meeting in Victoria Mill, Trafalgar Street: “The purpose of this motion is for us to agree what our red lines are, what is acceptable to us as a council.

“We need to look at the identities of our local boroughs.

“From my point of view an East Lancashire that would include Burnley being put in with Blackburn is something that just would not work.

“It would be too big but also because of the identities of our local communities.

“What we would potentially put forward is that there should be two unitaries for East Lancashire.

“The benefit of that would be that rather than having one voice on any mayoral combined authority East Lancashire would get two.

“I do not think a unitary authority for the whole of East Lancashire run from Blackburn is something that the people of Burnley want to see.”

Labour group leader Cllr Mark Townsend said: “Our red lines have to be backed up by evidence.

“We need to ensure the widest possible consensus.

“This is a 50-year decision.

“Where does resist start? It has to start now.”

Conservative group deputy leader Cllr Jamie McGowan said: “This is ultimately a Labour proposal to abolish Burnley Borough Council whether we are talking about whether we are talking about merging with Blackburn or whether we are not.

“The idea now is to close down Burnley Council and merge us into unitary authorities.

“There is nothing any councillor in this place can do about that.”