I have already argued that services for Southwell are best organised by local people, not from remote county hall etc. There is a debate on the next step for localism running by NALC. There should be a presumption that services should be organised and delivered locally. This would allow small local organisations to build delivery of public services together with their community.

Local Cllrs Beryl Prentice and Peter Harris. Southwell Town runs many services for the town - but due to the way in which the County Council and District Council publish their budgets find it difficult to identify spending in the town to run services more efficiently for the community.

The Localism Act’s Right to Challenge almost legitimises the aggregation of services at a larger than community level.

Budgets should be identified by locality not service, so that a service for a locality can be identified, and challenged. At present, County and District Council services are often collated and published at a County and District level – but by showing expenditure at a community level would allow communities to construct Neighbourhood Budgets and request the opportunity of delivering services.

Do let me know what you think about this, by mailing me at southwellfocus@gmail.com