All aboard the Kent local government reorganisation

At long last, council leaders in Kent have agreed to narrow down the choices for public consultation to two: Options 3A and 4B. They sound like bus numbers, but actually represent different local government models for the county.

Let’s remind ourselves what all this is about. Kent is one of many areas of Britain where there are multi-tiered council administrations, typically county, district, and parish. Only county and district councils are affected by the proposed reorganisation. The government’s vision is to replace county councils and district councils with unitary councils taking on the combined powers and statutory duties of both. But county councils have existed in one form or another since 1889 and districts since 1974. Why is this change necessary?

Overcomplicated and under-funded

One objective seems to be to reduce complexity and streamline service responsibilities.  Let’s take the management of waste as an example. At the moment in Kent, waste is collected by district councils. County councils dispose of it by recycling, incineration or landfill. The same applies with highways, where counties maintain the roads and districts manage parking. Counties manage street lighting, except where those lights are located in car parks. Public transport (mainly buses), social care, education, and flood prevention fall to county councils, whereas housing, planning (except mineral and regional planning), and coastal protection falls to the districts.

As you can see, this is a bit of a dog’s breakfast, with either overlapping interests or lacunas occurring, depending on where one lives. Both types of councils are also underfunded, and both have struggled since 2010 to maintain services, and hold down council tax below inflation. The government believes creating new unitary councils will achieve efficiencies, create financial resilience and improve capacity.

Redcliffe-Maud and the 1972 shake-up

We have been here before. In 1968, the Redcliffe-Maud Commission attempted something similar by breaking up the old local government structures, many of which were Victorian or even older in origin. It replaced them in provincial areas with what are now called unitary councils. The Commission would have divided Kent in two: East Kent and West Kent. It didn’t happen because the Conservative Party opposed the radical nature of the recommendations, and the Rural Districts Association objected on the grounds of a “loss of identity”.

Then came the Local Government Act 1972, which established the two-tier system of government we know today, merging existing smaller urban and rural districts into larger, more uniform units that could supposedly provide more efficient and cost-effective services. Under this model, districts were to deliver local services, while counties focused on broader services.

I can attest to local rivalries in Thanet, where its towns objected to losing their identities, and being replaced by a ruralist-thinking Thanet District Council. The same happened, to a lesser extent, in Dover. District councils were never embraced by urban communities and there lays the seeds of their dysfunction.  And 50 years later, the wheel has turned full circle. Reorganisation is a distinct prospect.

Options for the future of Kent

Following the request from the Minister for Local Government and English Devolution in February 2025, Kent and Medway councils have been working together with advisers to assess options for local government reoorganisation.  The majority have agreed to narrow the options to two. These are Option 3A and Option 4B.

Option 3A: Three Unitaries (North, West and East)

Under this option, Kent would be split into three unitary councils: North, West and East. It is understood that five existing councils are opposed to this plan due to concerns including loss of local identity under the model.

Option 4B – Four Unitaries (North, West, East and Mid)

Under this option, Kent would be split into four unitary councils: North, West, East and Mid-Kent. It is understood that only one existing council currently opposes this plan.

KCC’s preferred option: the Super County

Thanks to KCC , though, the waters have been muddied, because it is pushing forward with its own proposal. It is advocating for a single organisation with consultative bodies for east, west and north. What, if any, powers will these consultative bodies have? What will they decide on?  If the only option is rule from Maidstone, we might as well disband local government and be ruled from Westminster, it’s hardly any further away from East Kent, and has at least the advantage of doing away with boneheaded councillors, coming up with daft ideas.

The effect of KCC’s proposals would be to create a ‘Super County’: a single council serving an entire county.  Wiltshire and Cornwall fall into these categories. The outcome is not always happy, and in any case Cornwall has ambitions to be some kind of devolved nation state, on the basis that Cornwall was subsumed into England, and was not part of a unified polity. In my view you could equally make the same case for Kent or Wessex, or better still Yorkshire, based on historical precedent. Wiltshire has been more successful in that it is rural in structure, but devolved internally to give more powers to Salisbury, which the previous district councils never contemplated.

The Reform leadership in Kent is floating a super county, but it has also said that it wants the process ‘paused’ and contends that the costs of reorganisation are not clear.

The 500,000-person rule and keeping things simple

In 2020, the County Councils Network (CCN) commissioned PricewaterhouseCoopers (Pwc) to report on the benefits of reorganising local government in England, which they said had potential savings of £2.9bn over a five year period. Pwc upgraded that report in March 2025, saying that if unitary councils were formed with populations below 500,000 and nearer 300,000, that saving would become a cost of £850m above the current levels.  In Kent if we follow the CCN criteria of a 500,000 minimum population, Option 3A meets it best, with a North Kent, West Kent & East Kent split.

The simplest option in my view would be to divide Kent down the middle as provided for in the Redcliffe Maud report. This would have the benefits of simplicity and will meet the CCN criteria. The problem would be with Medway and Ashford who may not see things in the same way. As a compromise between KCC’s Super Council and a two-way split, the three-council, North,West and East Option 3A is the most appealing. It allows for reasonably-sized areas, which the public can relate to and local capitals, in Canterbury, Maidstone, and Chatham. It also meets the CCN criteria (just).

KPMG is now assessing the two shortlisted options in more detail and developing the business case for each. At the same time, Kent Council Leaders are asking the public to complete a survey on the proposed reorganisation.   Councils will then go through a process to determine which option they support, or whether they want to put forward their own option, as with KCC. Business plans need to be submitted to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government by 28 November.

Public consultation or public indifference?

I don’t believe for a minute that the general public care one way or another about local government reorganisation, as long as their bins are emptied and potholes are fixed. Public consultations are all very well but what they tend to do is become sounding boards for noise and fury on other matters, mainly for those like me, who can spend time debating the issues. The government will make the decision as they did in 1972, let’s hope they make the right choice.