Do the “No” group prefer to leave decision making in the hands of Westminster?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_of_Massachusetts

((By the way, how does one hyperlink in text here?))

What we should build on is our 3 city-regions (Newport-Gwent; Cardiff-East Glamorgan; Swanse-West Glamorgan and two mixed regions of North Wales and Dyfed Powys (except maybe Powys needs to be looked at again).

But then we should align all services such as NHS, Fire-Rescue, etc within these boundaries and then make them democraticially accountable

“Could work very well with an Assembly gaining in power, stature and authority. The need for an all-Wales approach to key services remains as strong as ever, and indeed for laws to be passed in those areas of competence. Authority would be delegated upwards for that end, but it would be targeted very precisely on those areas where it makes little sense for the local unit to act alone, or with only a few others. And the right to vary the approach according to local tastes and priorities would be built in. The localist agenda is presented too often as a challenge to devolved government, or the process of nation-building, but if you reverse the flow they segue beautifully. The national level becomes the constantly re-affirmed collective will of each part of Wales, rather than a central and centralising statelet.”

Personally, I believe that 22 local authorities are simply way too many, and am currently studying the local governance in other countries. Of particularly interested is the relationship between Swiss cantons and their centralised authority, and also the relationship between US States and their counties. Clearly, there is such a strong pull towards centralisation in Britain, but it seems the federal approach has a lot to recommend it.

Swiss cantons are responsible form the delivery of healthcare, welfare, law enforcement, public education, but also the ability of taxation. Also, cantons are able to determine the degree of even more localised municipalities and rural districts, which can very to a degree. The populations of cantons vary from 15,471 to 1,244,400. A similar approach and division of responsibility exists between US States and their local counties and cities.

With this framework in mind, there are primarily four regions in Wales that could form the basis for a Swiss style canton or a US style county. And indeed the NHC Wales has divided its delivery of services into three regions already, as has the Fire and Rescue Service, and Policing. These services are based on north Wales, mid and west Wales, and south Wales. Essentially, I would suggest returning to the 1962 report on Local Government Commission for Wales. I would propose the counties of Gwynedd for north Wales, Powys for mid Wales, Deheubarth/Dyfed for west Wales, and Glamorgan for south Wales. Each of these counties would operate much like those Swiss cantons or US style counties, with the Welsh Assembly as an oversight role for all-Wales matters. I believe that this kind of localised responsibly, devolved upwards in the manner you suggest, would encourage localised civic nationalism, with locals taking more ownership of their needs.

After all, let’s not confuse devolution to communities or localism with national political devolution. While I am not saying there should not be devolution of further powers, it is not a pre-requisite for unleashing the dynamism and latent creativity of people in our communities up and down Wales.

With new legislation putting mutuals on the same level playing field as the proprietary model likely to be on the statute book before the next election, such a framework offers real potential to release entrepreneurial and co-operative energy in ways that can transform our communites without there being any enhanced powers for the Assembly.

Remember, the goal remains empowerment and a climate in which the aspirations of the many, and not the few, are enabled.

Hendre – it’s a perfectly reasonable question, to which the answer is a guarded “yes”. I can see a continuing need for state-level functions from which the local or sub-state level would not be able to secede without a formal constitutional process. For everything else, it ought to be possible to imagine sovereignty – for want of a better word – resting at the local level.

This could be more important than assumed. At present, the localities would, we assume, opt to remain in federation with other Welsh localities, but in Union with each of the UK’s nations, which in turn remained in a looser union with the rest of Europe. But in time this might change, so for example they might choose to federate only with other Welsh localities for the purposes of state-level functions within the EU. In time, even this union might come to be surplus to requirements. We might end up with a Europe of the localities, with alliances formed and maintained according to the best (defined as the optimum trade-off between delivery and responsiveness) and all state-level functions operated on a pan-Europe basis.