Conservative Honourable Members And Local Government

EDM number 498 in 1995-96, proposed by David Rendel on 22/02/1996.

That this House regrets without surprise the failure of Conservative honourable Members to discuss the issue of reforming local government finance in the mature manner which the seriousness of the issue demands, in particular the inadequacy of the resources provided by central Government for local authorities to run a wide range of effective local services, the highly centralised nature of the current system for funding local authorites, the unfairness of the council tax as a major source of tax revenue and the suitablity of the local income tax as the most worthwhile alternative; and notes that Conservative honourable Members, rather than making constructive proposals for reform, have again resorted in EDM No. 474 to making only cheap party political points of the sort which all three political parties could made about authorities controlled by each others' councillors.

This motion has been signed by a total of 19 MPs.