Nottingham City

GREENS SAY NO TO ELECTED MAYOR!

In the referendum in Nottingham City we urged you to vote NO to having an elected mayor.

We oppose the creation of directly elected mayors on the basis that they concentrate too much power in the hands of one person and diminish the role of other councillors.

RESULT ANNOUNCED: 57% voted No to an Elected Mayor for Nottingham

The Green Party believes that local authorities run by single party cabinets, or by directly-elected mayors.are not in the best interests of local democracy. They take decision making powers away from councils as a whole and place them in the hands of a few individuals, leading to the disenfranchisement of those councillors who are not in the ruling party and the citizens they represent.

The Green Party would reintroduce the committee system across local government at all levels, which provides for direct councillor involvement in decision making.”

A mayoral contest often reduces politics to a celebrity competition where issues and policies are seen to be of secondary importance. You have only to look at London to see how that works, with everything reduced to the Boris and Ken Punch and Judy show.

If central government wanted local authorities to work more efficiently and effectively, then giving greater powers to councils would be a better way to bring that about.
That would include electing councillors by a PR voting system, as now happens in Scotland, so that the number of councillors elected for each party (or independents) is representative of their actual support.

Join the Rally on Saturday 5th May - March Against the City Council and Government Cuts!

We join with Nottinghamshire Save Our Services (NottsSOS) in calling for the setting of a Needs Based Budget that protects public services and saves the jobs of hundreds of public sector workers.

Right now unemployment is skyrocketing and the government is doing little about it. Our policy is to fight for a fair, stable and sustainable economy. Top bankers continue to pocket your money in the form of unearned bonuses, while factories, firms and farms are forced to lay off more and more workers by the day, week and month. This must end.
The gap between rich and poor in the UK has never been wider and it continues to get worse. The politics of austerity are crippling the economy, not helping it!

Published and promoted by Chris Dixon for Nottingham Green Party, both at Charnwood, Marston Road, Nottingham NG3 7AN