25/10/01
The National Assembly
today gave Rhondda Cynon Taff a big vote of confidence by extending our
term of office by another year to May 2004.
The Government consulted
widely on whether elections should be brought forward to 2002, held as
planned in 2003, or whether they should be pushed back to 2004.
The Plaid Group on Rhondda
Cynon Taff wanted elections to be as originally planned in 2003 but the
final decision by the coalition Assembly was to give us an extra year.
The extra year will help
the Plaid-run Council to continue the good work of making Rhondda Cynon
Taff more efficient and effective but also to implement new
arrangements for managing the Council.
We are currently
consulting the public on what type of executive arrangements we should
have and are also responding to Government consultation on new electoral
arrangements.
New Electoral
System
The new electoral system
is likely to be based on proportional representation. Single Transferable
Vote, multi-Councillor Wards and possibly an overall reduction in the
number of Councillors are all under active consideration.
One possibility is that
Taff's Well and Nantgarw could be merged with other wards, possibly
Hawthorn, Rhydfelin or Tonteg to create a multi member ward where
Councillors will be appointed using the Single Transferable Vote System.
Councillor Adrian Hobson
said;
" I favour a system of
proportional representation because it results in a better relationship
between votes cast and the political complexion of democratic
institutions. But it's too early to predict what the new system will look
like or the effect on Taff's Well and Nantgarw.
If Taff's Well and
Nantgarw are merged with other Wards it will change the way we vote.
There's certainly a risk that our communities could be under-represented
if, for example, we were merged with Hawthorn and Rhydfelin. Since most of
the votes in the new Ward would be cast elsewhere it's possible that none
of our Councillors would be from Taff's Well or Nantgarw.
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