Lancashire leader pledges Reform UK cost cutting will bring benefits

The leader of Lancashire County Council says the search for savings within the authority is designed to enable money to be reinvested in the "frontline services" on which people rely.

- by Paul Faulkner

Stephen Atkinson was defending his new Reform UK administration's focus on cost-cutting, which will step up a gear this week when the national party's controversial Elon Musk-style 'DOGE' unit pitches up at County Hall.

The self-proclaimed waste warriors are visiting the authority for what County Coun Atkinson says is a "scoping meeting" about the work they will be carrying out there.

The DOGE concept has been criticised by some opposition politicians, who have expressed concerns about the democratic legitimacy of bringing in a party-appointed external team - and questioned what kind of access they will have to council-held data.

Earlier this month, the new Reform cabinet also approved an "efficiency review" to be undertaken by the authority itself, which — although not referencing DOGEappeared to overlap both in its aims and some of its areas of focus, such as financial resilience and council contracts.

Asked by the Lancashire Post whether the two were entirely separate processes, County Coun Atkinson said: “I think they can work together, but... obviously, we seek advice and support from our national party - which is what DOGE is - like any party would... and then we have to govern the council separately to that.

“What we have got to do is take the best of DOGE and take the best of the council and bring them together so that we can deliver more money to frontline services - and that’s what this is all about in the end.”