openness. Asking elected representatives to endorse an unseen proposal fails these tests by any reasonable measure. But the concerns do not end inside the Council chamber. External partners, including NHS organisations, were asked to endorse Option A without being given the proposal either. Some statutory consultees effectively gave their blessing long before any detailed documents were published. How, then, can public bodies claim to have offered meaningful scrutiny? How can the Government place any weight on such endorsements? And how can those NHS organisations now respond to the upcoming statutory consultation without being pre- determined? The public, too, were left in the dark. The proposal was only published one day before the submission deadline. Residents, parish councils, community groups, and other stakeholders were shut out of the process. This last-minute release made it impossible for communities to understand the detail and offer informed comment, despite the Government’s explicit requirement for transparency and local consent. Equally problematic is the lack of cooperation across local authorities. While six of the seven councils collaborated on Option B, the County Council chose to press ahead with Option A alone. Aside from a shared data set, there was no joint work, despite repeated efforts from other councils to engage constructively. For a process that is meant to demonstrate collaboration and consensus, this is a big red flag. Taken together, these issues raise serious questions about democratic legitimacy. How can a proposal claim to represent local consensus when so many key voices - councillors, partner organisations, parish councils, and the public - were excluded from meaningful involvement? The Government now faces a critical choice: whether to accept a proposal submitted under these circumstances or to insist on the transparency, accountability, and due process that residents deserve and that other proposals took the trouble to comply with. At stake is not simply which model of local government prevails, but whether the process of arriving at that model is one that commands public trust.
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