{"id":434489,"date":"2026-02-19T16:46:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T16:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/434489\/"},"modified":"2026-02-19T16:46:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T16:46:12","slug":"basildon-council-leader-angry-with-pm-over-elections-u-turn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/434489\/","title":{"rendered":"Basildon Council leader &#8216;angry&#8217; with PM over elections U-turn"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A spokesperson for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said: &#8220;We want to work with local councils to deliver our ambition to simplify local government and end inefficient two-tier structures, including in Essex.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Kevin Bentley, Conservative leader of Essex County Council, backs a three-council model for the county.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He challenged Callaghan&#8217;s claim LGR was over in the county, telling the BBC: &#8220;I think it is over if we let it be.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;The current system does not give the best value for taxpayers. If the government is still up for it, then I am.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Liberal Democrat Stephen Robinson, leader of Chelmsford City Council, supports a five-council model for Essex.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;The process has been started and I don&#8217;t think a change of council leadership would make the government want to stop LGR,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;They are in charge of that process, not councils.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A spokesperson for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said: &#8220;We want to work with local&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434490,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-434489","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-kingdom","8":"tag-gb","9":"tag-great-britain","10":"tag-greatbritain","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}