I KNOW it’s supposed to be an exciting opportunity for the city and all that, but I find this whole asset transfer business distinctly underwhelming.

All that’s happening is that Wiltshire is giving back some of the stuff it purloined from Salisbury in the first place. Minus most of the valuable bits.

Of course it’s sensible, as city councillor Matthew Dean says, that local people take control of £700,000 worth of local services to make sure that they meet the public’s aspirations. Because Wiltshire has proved itself unable to do that.

It’s great that Shopmobility will be protected and enhanced, CCTV will be back on soon, and we’ll have cleaner streets.

But city clerk Reg Williams has warned that this extra workload will have “a fundamental effect on the size of the council”.

We know who’s going to foot the bill. City residents. (Which is still not a good reason to bully neighbouring parishes into unwanted mergers, by the way.) And you can bet Wiltshire won’t be reducing its own tax demands any time soon just because it’s had a bit of a clear out.

Never mind asset transfer, this is just the end of an exercise in asset-stripping.

Wiltshire still has control (maybe that’s putting it a bit strongly!) over all the big stuff that people get really fed up about, such as potholes and part-time recycling centres.

Yet it can’t keep the City Hall solvent, so now some poor devils are about to lose their jobs.

Call Me Jane’s deputy John Thomson has the nerve to describe the venue as “a drain on the revenue of this council”.

If so, perhaps he and his boss should have been a little more careful what they wished for when they blithely destroyed our district council.

The responsibility for taking proper care of what they took over falls squarely at their door.

If, as Cllr Thomson says, the hall is “dramatically underutilised”, invest in a makeover. Its drab and dated décor has ‘municipal’ written discouragingly all over it.

Create a welcoming bar/café area where people want to meet their friends. Put on more family-friendly daytime events, encourage more clubs to hire rooms with comfy, modern furniture. Offer parking discounts to conferences.

Bring in current bands, not just tribute acts, to attract younger audiences.

Oh no, there won’t be enough staff to cope.

Not so long ago there was grand talk about the hall and the Playhouse being at the heart of a trendy arts quarter, adding lustre to the redevelopment of the Maltings and central car park. What redevelopment would that be, then?

The really disastrous thing about our current system is that so many people don’t understand which council – unitary or city parish - has responsibility for what. It’s all too complicated. I’m sure that’s why Wiltshire gets away with so much.

  • Wilting at Wilton House in the Bank Holiday sun, I nevertheless bagged some amazing bargains. This year’s Rotary boot sale felt like the biggest and best yet, and I was so impressed by the cheerful, helpful volunteers coping with the massive crowds. I hope they made shedloads of money.
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