Away from eye of local storms

So then, was it a mistake to set up local councils? Just a waste of time and energy and, to an extent, money? If it was not completely so originally, it is beginning to look that now, with the local councils system seemingly unravelling. But, before hastening to write it off, a little bit more thinking about it could be helpful.

The system was born in political division and for a time remained under a cloud. The Labour Party was against politics being the ramification of the system. It preferred local elections not to be held under the aegis of political parties. That way, councillors would be independent and not subject to the party whip.

It was not to be. The Labour Party, like the Nationalist Party, ended up fielding its own candidates. A few brave candidates still stand as independents, but they are disadvantaged with the big political machines in fierce motion to garner every vote their party can get, as if it was the general election all over again.

Gradually the administrative local system expanded. Early fears that it would merely duplicate the national set-up, to become an additional burden to the taxpayer, did not materialise. Instead a local council budget came into being whereby the central government delegated an increasing area of administration to the councils.

It became to a limited extent an exercise in devolution. The limitation arose out of the fact that, at the political level councillors remained under the tight rein of their party. While at the administrative level the government set up local controls to ensure fiscal and administrative accountability. The latter development was necessary, the former simply an obstacle in the way to the effective development of local government.

There were instances of petty politics making a mockery of the experiment, as well as other occasions of puerile intra-party confrontations. Yet the system staggered along. Until, that is, the current silly season came along. Suddenly it seems to be falling apart.

Several councillors have been held up in a bad light by their own party, at times beginning from their own council colleagues. Camaraderie was not always spelt in the same way. Charges of personal financial irregularities, real or alleged, are becoming the order of the day. The Nationalist Party has made a step forward whereby party councillors under sharp allegation or investigation are expected to resign from the party. Not a bad thing, had that mirrored a similar culture at the central government level. The Delimara extension affair showed it did not.

At the moment it is the Sliema mayor who is in the eye of the storm. Mere outsiders like me should not dare attempt to judge what has taken place and what is going on. But some unsavoury suggestions of how the system works are at times emerging.

Clearly, the time has arrived for a general clean-up of the local-council stables, even where no hanky-panky is suspected. A shake-up becomes necessary in any system. Yet, it would be wrong, at this stage, to write off local councils. Properly run, and if only the parties kept at least a certain distance from them, they have some positives to offer.

True devolution from central government and party could help a culture of involvement, a measure of direct democracy to spring up whereby the citizenry does see itself being put first because its voice is listened to and, on occasion, heeded. The system could encourage young candidates towards it so that, if elected, and if their council follows a reasonable degree of bi-partisanship, they can gain some experience of bureaucratic administration, before they venture into the broader field of national politics.

On their part citizens can be empowered to participate more intensively than they have done so far in periodical local council general meetings. There is scope for all that. If national party officials stepped back from the system it would be one important move to help such scope to be far better realised than it has been so far.