A boris in every city rejected

[Gromit]

// David Cameron's dream of elected mayors in Britain's major cities looks to be in tatters after the idea was rejected in referendums.

Manchester, Nottingham and Coventry have voted against the concept, and there are signs that Birmingham and others have also dismissed the plan.
The results are embarrassing for the Prime Minister, who had thrown his weight behind the changes in a series of speeches and interviews.

Mr Cameron had attempted to use the example of London Mayor Boris Johnson, saying he wanted a ''Boris in every city''. //

City Mayors are a waste of time and money, and no one wants them. Should they all be scrapped?

[Gromit]

http://www.telegraph....city-mayors-plan.html

[d9f1c7]

Good choice by the people. Yes they should be scrapped and while you are at it Gromit we have too many incompetent snouts in the trough running the country. Now every council in Britain should be reduced by 75%, abolish the Scot/Welsh talking shops and 50% of MP's and M'luds. Now your talking. We don't need all that "democracy". The people in those cities have shown the way.

[d9f1c7]

Our local council has over 60 members, I've met several of them and a bi66ger shower of useless sh1te you could not imagine. I reckon the town could be run with a dozen decent managers.

[Davethedog]

I would really like to see the London office gone.

Its just an added level of cost and bureaucracy, taking maoney away from local councils for vanity

[TheNovice]

Got no opinion either way really, think the London Mayor works but it's nice for people to have their say. What I have noticed is the remarkably low turnout. Think that speaks volumes.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-17854687 Only 91,000 voted in Manchester, guessing population of Manchester....2.5 million, say 70% have the vote, all very ball park I admit....this gives 5% turnout....can't be right surely. Was this Manchester as a city or Greater Manchester? Anyone know

[youngmafbog]

Could not put it better D9

In my council there has been a pay rise of over 200% for someone and we have a dozen over a 100k a year. This is for a small town no where near London and is ridiculous.

And next on the list should be the other snouts in the Euro trough, an even bigger waste of space.

[pdq1]

I thought the Tories were all for removing layers of bureauracy. Its not just the Lord Mayor, its his offices, the hundreds of ancillary staff, the election costs and the friction between his political leanings and the councils under his umbrella.

[mightyWBA]

Just another load of expense on politicians.
About time MP's,MEP's,Local Councillors and their like were cut back.
They have even more in Scotland,Wales and Northern Ireland.

Far too many windbags spouting the same old drivel.

[mightyWBA]

Bit like on here!

[emmie]

not Lord Mayor, that is a different office, person. Boris is Mayor of London.

[New Judge]

Margaret Thatcher went to great lengths to abolish the Greater London Council, finally succeeding in doing so in 1986. If ever there was an unnecessarily bureaucratic, cumbersome, superfluous and sometimes corrupt organisation, that was it.

Soon after Labour came to power they offered the people of London the chance to have an "elected Mayor". The people of London voted narrowly in favour, many of them thinking they would get an autonomous mayor (perhaps like the Mayor of New York) who would cut the red tape and prevarication and who would take personal responsibility to solve many of London’s issues.

So, in the year 2000, as a Millennium present, what did they get? A “GLC 2” in the form of the London Assembly, filled with a succession of wasters, political oddballs and busybodies, soaked in the usual Party Political claptrap (of all colours), arguing the toss with each other over which of them would make a worse job of running the capital. Many of them were not elected directly by the voters of London but were chosen by their parties under the PR “list” system. Of course they needed a “small staff” (of about 1,000) to cater for their every need.

A Mayor to take decisions about transport strategy policing and other capital-wide matters would be useful. The GLA is a waste of time, money and effort and simply impedes anything the Mayor might like to do. Following the latest election in London the situation will be even worse because it seems likely that the city will have a Tory Mayor and a Labour dominated assembly.

The people of the cities who chose not to have an elected Mayor chose wisely. They would almost certainly end up with another layer of useless, expensive government which would provide them with little or nothing. In London either the Mayor and the GLA or the London Borough Councils need to be abolished. There is certainly no need for both and I seriously doubt there is a need for either.