Perspectives on the Liverpool crisis

Conclusion

The discussion above remains only one example of a local government responding to the pressures of increasing scarcity in budgetary resources and in several senses increasing policy tasks. In Liverpool's case those increasing tasks have to a considerable extent been self inflicted, as a socialist council pursues policies that fly in the face of national government policy. While budgetary restraint and the response of Liverpool Council have not resulted in major reform, the restrictive nature of central government regulation has led to a major and national debate on the sovereignty of the local as against the national state. To some extent, in Liverpool at least, there has been a ‘cultural’ reform in the past few years that has produced considerable public support for a series of socialist ‘reactive’ policies. The style of policy making in the period is affected by an ideologically committed party that for better or worse has accepted a brand of ‘democratic centralism’ as a vital mechanism to achieve extremely ambitious aims in deleterious circumstances. The success of this brand of politics and policies is unproven. But one thing is certain. Liverpool local politics will remain in the foreseeable future a hotbed of ideological zeal and resistance to central dictat, an ongoing thorn in the side of national monetarist policies and a continuing reminder that localgovernment in Britain still has some life left in it. Unfortunately, the role of the law in all this is capable of being seen as merely repressive, as Parliament passes statutes imposing increasing restrictions upon local authorities and councillors and the courts are called upon to implement them.