The independent Local Government Boundary Commission for England is carrying out an electoral review of Erewash Borough Council.
The first part of an electoral review is to decide how many councillors should represent the district in future – we call this ‘council size’.
The council currently has 51 councillors.
The Commission is now holding a six-week public consultation to decide whether the council should have 47 or 43 councillors in future.
Erewash Borough contains 46,224 households and covers an area of over 42 square miles. The market towns of Ilkeston and Long Eaton contain approximately 70% of the borough’s total population.
The latest electoral register shows that there are 86,221 voters living in Erewash borough. The Council currently has 51 councillors and each councillor represents an average of 1,691 voters.
The Council has a system of governance known as “leader and cabinet” in which a group of executive councillors make decisions within a policy framework agreed by the Council. There are currently five councillors in the cabinet, including the Leader of the Council.
The Council voted for a council size of 47, which is a reduction of four from the current 51. The Council’s submission was followed by a supplementary submission from the Conservative Group.
The submission talked about the community representational aspect of councillor work, with reference to community forums. It explored how constituents approach councillors and how councillors currently fulfil their representative role.
The Conservative Group expressed concern that a significant reduction of councillors could lead to a narrowing of expertise in the Council as a whole, which could have a negative effect on committees.
The Conservative Group argues that 47 councillors would be sufficient to enable to Council to carry out its regulatory and scrutiny functions without significant change to the current management or governance structure.
Links to the Consultation page and the alternative address to write to can be found on the side of this page.