The public have so little reason to have confidence in politicians these days that another attempt to reorganise local government is unlikely to become a serious political issue. However, there is one aspect of reorganisation which Ryedale voters should be careful not to forget. This concerns the Council’s reserves.

Unlike many Councils, Ryedale has no debt. The Council’s housing stock was sold in 1991, and the net proceeds of sale were about £18M. Of this, just over £5M was spent on building the leisure pool at Monks Cross (which was then part of Ryedale), and, on the reorganisation of 1996, the rest was split between York and Ryedale. This was because half of Ryedale’s population was taken into the City of York.

One might have expected the money taken by York would have been spent in the part of Ryedale which transferred to York in 1996. In fact, not one penny of it was spent there, and this is why Ryedale voters should take an interest in the potential merger of Ryedale with other councils – once the merger happens, Ryedale voters will be outnumbered by the voters of the other merged districts, and will lose all control over how the remaining money is spent.

Since 1996, the original fund of £6M has grown to over £8m. It produces interest, which has only recently been used to support the Council Tax – and then less than two fifths is used for that purpose: the rest is allowed to build up and increase the reserves.

There have been several suggestions about how the money should be spent. There is the proposed dry sports centre. This has been progressing at snail’s pace over the last three years. We go from report to report and never seem to get anywhere! However, this project has at least reached the stage where drawings have been prepared and options are under discussion.

There is much opposition to this project. There are those who think the money should be spent on the provision of social housing. In fact, it already has. There used to be a Government fund which would pay back most of the money Ryedale spent on housing from its reserves. Some people used to call this government fund “the Bottomless Pit”! It was cut off a few years ago, but, in the meantime, the Council had used it to pay for the building of over 500 housing association houses.

Those councillors who say the remaining reserves should be spent on Council housing have, as far as I know, never put forward any schemes, other than those that would be paid for out of the Bottomless Pit. This leads one to question whether or not they are really serious about spending the council’s money on social housing, or are simply using an emotive argument as a spoiling tactic in a totally negative manner.

Then there are those who would like to see the money spent on industrial development. In fact, officers were instructed to look at this many months ago. Yet, as far as I know, little has been done except to look for sites where industrial development might take place, as part of the town and country planning process. No civil engineer or architect has been appointed, nor has any capital project of this kind been identified. So, again, one has to ask if the proponents of industrial development are serious, or whether they are simply using this idea too as spoiling tactics.

In the meantime, while this debate goes on, we are rapidly approaching the date in July when the Government will produce a White Paper with their latest proposals for local government reorganisation by merger into larger less democratic councils. If no action is taken to commit Ryedale to certain identified capital spending schemes very soon, it will be too late to spend the Council’s reserves in Ryedale on any project – and the merged authority will be able to do what it likes with Ryedale’s money.

Indeed, one wonders if this is the hidden agenda. Even now, the Council is not reducing its reserves. Instead, in spite of the reorganisation threat, it continues to pay large sums of money from Council tax into Reserves.

It is possible that I am reading far too much into this situation. Well, it should not be difficult for Councillors to prove me wrong. All they have to do is to come up with some positive identified capital projects and commit the Council’s reserves to financing them now.