Drive behind city devolution bid is attacked by councillors

MOVES to create a “Greater Gloucester” authority is being driven by one councillor’s decades-long wait to become city leader only to see the council face abolition according to the opposition. Liberal Democrat Jeremy Hilton became Gloucester City Council's leader after his party won the local elections last year some 42 years after he first became a councillor.

- Carmelo GARCIA Local Democracy Reporter

The Kingsholm and Wotton member has been promoting the idea of creating a Greater Gloucester council as part of the reorganisation of local government. The English Devolution white paper which was published in December sets out that district and county authorities should be merged and new unitary councils created as a result.

Currently, Gloucestershire is a two-tier authority area where services are shared between the County Council at Shire Hall and each of the six districts. There are three options being considered in the county.

The first option, preferred by Gloucestershire County Council and Tewkesbury Borough Council, is for the whole county to become a single unitary with a population of about 650,000.

A second option, put forward by councils in Cheltenham and the Cotswolds and favoured by five of the county's seven MPs is to create two unitary councils, broadly divided between east and west.

And then there is a third option being put forward by Cllr Hilton which looks at creating a unitary authority centred around Gloucester which would include nearby parishes such as Brockworth, Churchdown, Hardwicke, Highnam, Longford and Upton St Leonards.