Council reorganisation

THE FOREST OF DEAN DISTRICT COUNCIL IS SET TO BE ABOLISHED BY 2028 as the Government's plans for devolution take effect. Cllr Gill Moseley writes:

All the Gloucestershire second-tier councils like the FoDDC, Tewkesbury Borough and Gloucester City councils will be swept up into a unitary authority along with their statutory powers and responsibilities such as waste collection, environmental health and planning.
The rest of the UK has consistency in their local government structure but at the moment, there are far too many different models in England ranging from three-tier, like ours, with town and parish councils at the lowest level, and district and county councils sitting above them. 
Some councils have already adopted the unitary model like Herefordshire which has combined the upper two tiers into one unitary council.
Then there are unitary authorities that have joined together as combined (strategic) authority with or without a mayor such as Greater Manchester. This is what the Labour government wants ALL councils to do. Funding for major infrastructure projects will come mainly to those combined (strategic) authorities with a mayor 
The number of upper-tier councillors will be drastically reduced and it will fall to town and parish councils to step up and fill the vacuum. How? We don't know. There is nothing in the government's White Paper except reference to parish and town councils 'wiring up' whatever that may mean.
As far as larger towns that are now second tier authorities like Gloucester City and Cheltenham Borough, they are likely to become large town councils within the parish and town council lower tier, just like Tewkesbury and Cirencester already are. 
The assets of the FoDDC will need to be transferred such as the Lakeside car park in Newent. And what will happen to the support provided to the community which is not a statutory service? 
Looking to the top of the local government hierarchy, for Liberal Democrats, the idea of so much power going to one person in the form of an elected mayor of a strategic authority with minimum of 1.5m people is not devolution. How can one person understand the needs of all the different communities within that huge region? There may be some benefits though of regional administration - mayoral authorities will be able to take over control of the public transport network in their area for example and create better-integrated services. 
There are two phases in the devolution process and Gloucestershire will be in the second phase as it is nowhere near working out how to create a unitary council or deciding which strategic authority it might join.
Whatever shape the devolution takes, things will look very different in a few years' time for local government in this area.