Reform’s bid to slash council bureaucracy defeated

By Elgan Hearn, Local Democracy Reporter

Elon Musk’s chainsaw will not be taken to slash bureaucracy in Powys as councillors rubbished a Reform UK motion to establish a DOGE-style role at the authority.

At a meeting of Powys County Council, Reform UK group leader Cllr Iain McIntosh brought forward the motion to establish a DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) role and called for a cabinet member to be assigned to oversee the council’s “efficiency agenda”.

Cllr McIntosh hoped that chief executive Emma Palmer could bring the proposal to fruition within three months.

Cabinet Member for Customers, Digital and Community Services, Cllr Raiff Devlin (Liberal Democrat), said: “This is a gimmick it’s simply a political stunt, the notion you can employ a single person who will oversee efficiency across an organisation of this size and scale is nonsensical.

“Are they going to be an expert in adult services, education, engineering, building control, leisure?”

He added that paying a salary of £70,000 for this type of role was not efficient in itself.

“This is a complete load of nonsense,” said Cllr Devlin.

Chief Executive, Emma Palmer, said: “We must have a focus on value for money, but I’m annoyed on the constant negativity around the organisation and ask you to balance it on the basis of the positive and great work being done by our staff.”

She read out the savings figures the council has had to produce in each budget since 2019 which includes the expectation for this year.

Mrs Palmer added: “Over seven years, that’s £83.4million, there is more we can and will do.”

Cllr McIntosh said: “In terms of savings you have made some valid points. I’m sure everybody outside this room will still make the point if these savings have been made: why can’t we get our potholes repaired, why are residents being refused social services because they live too far out in the sticks, why are we closing our schools?

“Inefficiencies are costing us tens of thousands of pounds a week while Council Tax goes up all the time.

“These are all valid reasons why this motion was brought forward it’s not some political game or anything to do with what’s going on in America.”

He stressed it was to make sure that residents knew that their Council Tax is “spent wisely”.

The motion then went to a vote and 40 councillors voted against it, four voted for it and six councillors abstained.