Hoylake Vision has announced on their facebook page the result of Thursday’s Hoylake referendum:
974 votes counted
1 spoilt
834 Yes
140 No
Voter turnout was approximately 21%.
The Yes vote means that Wirral Borough Council is now committed to using the local neighbourhood plan when deciding planning applications in Hoylake.
So is this good for families with young kids who want to see more things to do? Or will this stop things happening?
Does anyone know what this means???
For me it was a no-brainer to vote for local involvement in decisions made for us by our county council. But I am sceptical as to how much this voting opportunity is just paying lip service to real democracy?
Local councils have been given more decision making powers for some years about how it spends its tax payers money. But when central government remove huge chunks of the very money that makes that power to spend viable; what real powers do county councils and by implication local priorities really have?
It seems we are getting new Promenade benches due to a popular vote in voting for a variety of local initiatives. This money is from a small ‘charitable’ fund made by Wirral council for each of its wards. That is great, good for Hoylake. Yet that same council spent more on bulldozing the old toilet block (for even more benches) that was built by rate payers money years ago, instead of enabling a much needed cafe to be built on that site. The only public toilets (also paid for by tax payers) at the top end of Meols prom, are closed most of the time due to lack of care-taking staff available.
The above examples are just small examples of how manipulation of our money and of democracy is hidden by populist sops to a mostly apathetic residents.