November 1996 - Possible Merger of Parishes
The Seavington News - November, 96
POSSIBLE MERGER OF PARISHES
Parish Council letter to Paddy Ashdown, MP
“At last year’s election of Parish Councillors the Parish Council received a number of comments from parishioners, particularly those who consider themselves as Seavington St Michael residents, finding that they could only vote for Councillors for the parish of St Mary. This is due to the way the residential areas of Upton Lane/Water Street have grown up around the ancient boundaries - some parts of each being in the parish of St Mary and some in the parish of St Michael.
It was also voiced that parishioners should be able to vote for all 7 Councillors regardless of where they reside. Although made up of 4 Councillors from St Mary and 3 from St Michael, the Council runs as one - Seavington Parish Council.
The question of the possibility of merging the two parishes has been discussed at our meetings, but reservations were put forward that the loss of separate identities might not be popular with parishioners, and that in any case their opinions would need to be sought before making any approach to the Boundaries Commission.
Initially, the question we would like resolved is whether merging and loss of boundaries/identities are synonymous. Are you able to advise us on this aspect, please? The Chairman, Mr Uncles, has indicated that he would be willing to talk this over with you at one of your roving surgeries.”
Response
`The parishes of Seavington St Mary and Seavington St Michael have been grouped under a common parish council, called Seavington Parish Council, by virtue of an order made under the provisions of section 11 of the Local Government 1972.
As Seavington Parish Council has discovered, for some parish electors it is a drawback of grouping that legislation requires that there shall be separate representatives on the council for each parish within a group or, where a parish is warded, for each parish ward. The only solution to this position, as the law stands, would be to abolish the existing councils and replace them with a new parish covering the combined area. The disadvantage of this would, of course, be that the historic identities of the original areas as parishes would be lost.
The relevant district council has the discretion to create a parish group by order upon the application of a parish meeting, as long as the parish meetings of the other parishes involved consent. Likewise, the district can by order “un-group” a parish on the application of the parish meeting.
The process for existing parishes to be dissolved and replaced by a new parish covering the combined area is a little more involved. I can only implement such
a change in response to a specific recommendation made by the Local Government Commission following a review undertaken on my direction.
Should Seavington Parish Council conclude that they wish to seek a review in order to abolish the two existing parishes and replace them with a new one for the combined area, we will, of course, add such a request to those we already hold.
I should explain, however, that there is local pressure from a number of areas for parish boundary reviews. The difficulty is that this has to be weighed against other priorities. The Commission has recently begun a programme of periodic electoral reviews which are overdue in a number of places. Our general view is that this work has to take precedence, an I therefore announced in March that there will only be 4 parish reviews this year - Milton Keynes, the East Riding of Yorkshire, Hampshire and Surrey. I will, however, be considering later in the year which areas should be the subject of directions for parishing reviews in 1997/98.”