Local Government Reform
Many of the major schemes of social reconstruction—concerning, for instance, planning, housing, education, and health—depend in one way or another upon action to be taken by local authorities ; and reform of local government is perhaps the first condition of efficiency. Important proposals on the subject are embodied in an interim report issued by a committee appointed by the National Association of Local Government Officers. Its aim is to
centralise and unify within a number of areas, each large enou for efficient administration. Leaving the larger county borou as they are, for the rest it proposes to divide the country into number of directly elected all-purpose authorities, with a populati between too,000 and 500,000. Each of these in mainly rural ar would delegate purely local functions to smaller local governm units. To meet regional needs extending over a still wider ar it is proposed to set up provincial councils indirectly elected by constituent authorities ; these councils, though not actually exercis administrative powers, would make recommendations in regard t such. matters as planning which 'would be mandatory upon th all-purpose authorities. Here is a plan which has the virtue simplicity and uniformity without changes of a too violent character and of emanating from men versed in the practical executive tas of local government.
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