Mid Suffolk District Council Tory leaders defect as Independents over Suffolk County Council devolution decision

Tory councillors have defected as Independents after being left 'appalled and dismayed' over devolution decisions.

Over the weekend, four Mid Suffolk district councillors have decided to form a new independent group after defecting from the Conservative Party.

Cllrs James Caston, Lavinia Hadingham, Anders Linder and John Whitehead criticised last month's county council decision to join the Government's devolution priority programme and ask to delay the local elections in May.

They said: [We] are both appalled and dismayed that our Conservative county colleagues have so swiftly embraced this change imposed by the Labour Government and agreed to extend their likely term in office from four years to possibly seven years, serving unelected beyond their period of mandate and without any prior consultation with residents."

Under the devolution plans, district and borough councils would be scrapped and replaced with unitary authorities — these would represent at least 500,000 people but with certain exceptions possible.

The Government is looking to create new mayoral authorities, with a single directly elected mayor covering large geographies and with powers over transport infrastructure, health improvement and blue light services.

The new independents said they believed any mayoral authority would most likely cover all of Norfolk and Suffolk, which would take away an important layer of local representation.

They added: "We believe the upheaval in the short to medium term will cause significant disruption to our council services and will be costly in terms of the significant reorganisation required.

"It will remove an essential layer of local democracy whilst creating a significantly larger and more remote unitary body."

The group promised to use the remainder of the authority's lifespan to 'scrutinise and comment on this unnecessary and damaging reorganisation of local government'.

Mid Suffolk's leader, Cllr Andy Mellen, praised the group's decision as acting 'with their values and conscience' and in the best interests of residents.

He said: "We understand the difficulty of the decision they have made and look forward to a growing degree of pragmatic collaboration."

Their decision comes just a week before Mid Suffolk and Babergh councillors are scheduled to debate devolution.

Although most councillors will have said their piece by the time the meeting is over, no decision will be taken as that was a matter for the county council in January.