Council watcher, and commentator on this blog, Lone Ranger, asks whether the mayoral system that the people of Lewisham chose as the system of local government they wanted could work if the Mayor was of a different party to that of the Council.

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The short answer is yes it would.  Indeed that’s been the day to day reality in most of the areas that have taken up this model outside ffice:smarttags" />London.  As a recent report on the mayoral model points out:

The mayoral elections saw a substantial number of independent mayoral figures elected in areas that had previously had seen party control as the dominant form of politics. In total five independents were elected. Four Labour candidates were elected. A Liberal Democratic candidate won in a previously Labour-stronghold in Watford and a Conservative candidate won in traditionally Labour North Tyneside and a replacement Conservative candidate was elected when a by-election was called following the resignation of the first mayor. Mayoral politics appears to allow greater scope for independents and provide an opportunity for the electorate to choose a different direction for local politics.

As to how Labour Councillors might react in the hypothetical situation of the Mayor in Lewisham being of a different party, or none, well who knows.  However, what I can say for sure is there hasn’t been any reluctance to discuss any of the issues of controversy as far as I can tell.  They’ve been discussed in private in meetings of Labour Group, they’ve been discussed in public in scrutiny meetings, cabinet meetings, and at full council.  What Labour Councillors have been reluctant to do is to follow the opposition parties, who have the luxury of trying to have things all ways. 

Lone Ranger then goes on to suggest that we throw out the party system at local level and operate in some other, undefined, manner.  There are of course independent councillors already, and in some areas single issue groups have taken over the running of councils.  They have though as far as I can see not done away with the normal operating procedures of political parties; in other words they try to have an agreed position on major issues, and act as a single body.  If you don’t do that then making decisions becomes quite difficult.

Personally I’m wedded to the party political system as I’ve explained before I think it has advantages that you can’t get from less structured systems.