A Ramsey MHK believes government needs to be getting involved in the ongoing situation with the Northern Civic Amenity Site.
Lawrie Hooper says a 'solution' could be to remove the quarry rates income from Bride Commissioners and use this money to fund the £67,000 shortfall.
The joint committee which operates the site claims that Bride is ‘determined’ to ‘ignore logic and respect’ for the rates system which pays for services.
Hello, I'm local demarcity reporter Emma Draper, and I've been speaking to Ramsey M.H.K. Larry Hooper about the ongoing situation with the Northern Civic Community site. He believes the government needs to be stepping in to sort out the problems. Well, it's crazy, isn't it? Let's be honest. I mean, it all comes down to, I think, the individual commissioners wanting to make the best decision for their residents, which generally means lower rates. And we have, obviously, in the North, a significant disagreement between bride commissioners and everybody else as to what the right thing is for the North of the island. And ultimately, I think the Northern Committee and all the commissions up there are trying to do the right thing, trying to get bride back around the table, and not getting a feeling that's happening. Ultimately, the risk here is that something will happen to the Northern community site. We've already seen a letter from the Northern Committee saying without government support, it's going to end up being handed back. I don't think anybody wants to see that. I think having it run locally is the right thing for the North. It's a really good site. It is quite frustrating, I think, to be in this position. But ultimately, my view is government is probably going to need to step in and act. And I think the easiest way of doing that, because all of this ultimately is about rates. And the disparity between how rates are collected in bride versus everywhere else is to deal with that issue at source. Basically, look at the way we collect quarry rates and say, well, if that's causing you all of these issues, if that's causing such a difficulty, fine, we'll just collect those centrally. And actually, that resolves the issue overnight, because that will raise, that's 60 grand, that the Northern site needs. You could simply say, well, collect those centrally and use it to fund the Northern collective site in the North. And then if bride wants to come back to the table, their contribution would be based on their residential raceable value, which is a lot lower, and actually would significantly reduce their contribution as well. So it seems like a relatively straightforward solution. But it is going to need government, in this case, the treasury, I think, to act to do that. I don't think it's a particularly complex piece of legislation, but I'm always in favour of actually tackling these problems, rather than just kicking them into the long grass. So to my mind, if the committee, if all the commissioners in the North can't get back around the table and agree something collectively, I would have no problem at all in pushing government to step in and say, we're going to solve this, because it needs solving. Do you think that this situation has actually opened up the discussion for rate reform and the need to look at how local authorities are structured? I think it has, but I think I would be nervous about trying to fold anything like this into a massive piece of rate reform. The issue we're facing here is very specific to the collection of quarry rates and the way that's dealt with in one particular area, two areas, I think, but in this case, one area. I would be nervous about saying, oh, we're not going to fix that. What we're going to do instead is we're going to fix the whole rating system on the island, and then nothing will happen. That's Tim Wood's national solution with these things is, yeah, we'll just leave it, we'll fix everything all at once. It's not going to happen. So my view is, let's fix this particular issue and then have a bigger conversation about rate reform, because the rate reform disparity is pretty big as an issue, especially in Ramsey, because we see the way that works and the disparities you have with people, literally the other side of the town boundary, and the whole system is definitely needed to shake up. But in this instance, I think there is a relatively simple fix that solves the issue around the Northern community site, which secures that for the people of the North, which will help everyone in the North, actually, it'd be the right thing to do. And then there is a conversation to be had around, okay, what does this mean then for rate reform more broadly? What will you be doing to try and get the situation resolved? So I've already written to the Treasury Minister asking about this. We've had some correspondence from the Northern Committee as well, and I've already responded to them expressing support for the position that I'm outlining. So ultimately, I'm going to keep on about that and keep pressing them and say, Treasury, you have to act, and hopefully the Treasury actually taking that seriously and taking steps to act will encourage bride to come back to the table and actually reach some kind of agreement with the rest of the North. That is always the best solution, is get people to agree to things. But ultimately, we've been elected as national politicians to tackle these problems to make these sort of decisions, and if government can step in with the solution that is fair and makes sense for everybody, it really should. What correspondence have you had from residents about the situation? I know it's clear from social media that people are unhappy about the number of closures and the changes that we've made to the sites. So what have you had from residents? So yeah, it's been quite a lot, actually. I think most people that I've taught you understand it, understand the context that, you know, because bride have pulled out, that's created a financial shortfall, and so in the short term, there needs to be some way of plugging that gap, which I think is why the committee decided to make reductions in service. The question that's being asked is, well, what does that mean? Does it mean government steps in and pays for it out of our taxes? Or does it mean that all the rates in everyone else in the North go up to compensate? And that's really only a question that the committee themselves can answer. People are definitely not happy with things like the closure of the reuse, site up there, and then some of the restrictions, but I think everyone understands why the committee have had to do this and have been pushed into this position. So I think there would be quite a lot of support in Ramsey, at least, for reforming where this is dealt with to actually have it resolved rather than have this sit on a shelf and wait for us such a long time to be fixed. Have you spoken, I know you said that you've spoken to the committee, but have you spoken to the commissioners at all about the situation or even bride commissioners about the situation? So I've spoken with a couple of individual commissioners. In Ramsey, I'm trying to organise a meeting at the moment, just have we have regular catch-ups anyway, so it's almost certainly going to be something that comes up at our next regular commissioners and MHK catch-up that we have. I have spoken with the few of them, I've spoken with the few of the officers and the town clerk down there as well, and there was a public meeting, quite recently that I attended and there was a lot of engagement there between lots of residents, actually residents of bride, residents of the North and the Northern Committee. Bride didn't send a representative, I think there were one or two commissioners maybe in the audience, but they didn't actually send someone there, so there hasn't been any of that engagement. Because this is very much a local authority matter, isn't really for me to step in at that local authority level. If that makes sense, I think because it's become such an issue because it's now escalated to that national stage, now's the time when an MHK or the MHKs of the North really need to get involved and that's kind of where we're at I think. Your fellow Northern MHK Tim Johnston said he wants to see a roundtable discussion with all the parties that are affected involved. Is that something you would agree with and you'd like to see? I think that's where I would have always started with this, is to say get them back around the table. My understanding is that's been tried and hasn't got anywhere. Tim's obviously in a very different position because he has six parishes to represent, one of which being bride of the others obviously not, whereas from a Ramsey perspective I think the view of Ramsey collectively would be this is unfair, it isn't right that actually one party can unilaterally have such a big impact on everybody else in the North, we are all in this together ultimately. So yes, a roundtable discussion, get everyone talking, see if they can find an agreed solution would absolutely be the preferred route, but I think as with everything where government has the ability to act, we need to be working on that because if that roundtable discussion doesn't happen, doesn't happen quickly enough, or happens but doesn't resolve anything, government's going to have to step in and say well we left you try it yourselves, it didn't work so we're going to go to Tim and we're going to change the rules, it's that simple. And where do you think the £67,000 should come from? Well like I said the quarry rate that's paid at the minute roughly is about that, it isn't any more complicated than that, the bride rate payers actually don't strictly speaking contribute to the Northern site because the amount of money that they pay in pretty much comes from the quarry rate and so this is rate that's already collected and where he goes into the pot so it isn't any different from saying well last year that's what you paid in and next year it's what you're going to pay and it's the same amount of money essentially, the only other option would be to increase rates everywhere else or take the money out of the tax system which inevitably has knock-on impacts so unless people want to pay more money so that bride can have a reduction in their own rateable value then the fair solution is to say well we'll just take those rates that are already being paid and use those to fund the thing that we were already funding with it. Ultimately there will be an knock-on impact but I would rather there be an impact on a smaller number of people rather than impact on everybody in the North. Thank you for making it to the end of the Manx Radeon newscast you are obviously someone with exquisite taste. May I politely suggest you might want to subscribe to this and a wide range of Manx Radeon podcasts at your favourite podcast provider so our best bits will magically appear on your smartphone. Thank you. [BLANK_AUDIO]
