County Council moves forward with its proposals to “Keep Derbyshire Together”

21 March 2025 2

Derbyshire County Council has submitted its initial proposals for local government reorganisation to government, presenting a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to “Keep Derbyshire Together” and improve the quality of life for all its residents.

The council is releasing today, this summary of its submission as a statement to the media and public.

Following the government’s announcement of a major reorganisation of local councils across England, ordering all two-tier council areas to move to single-tier unitary authorities, the county council has carefully considered the best options for Derbyshire.

The county council’s proposal is to have one single unitary council on the current county footprint, with Derby remaining in its current form as a city unitary council

This would mean that one council would continue to serve Derbyshire’s 800,000 residents for services such as social care, education, roads, children’s services and waste recycling centres. Other services would also be brought under one council – including bin collections, housing, parks and leisure – allowing services to work more closely together and to provide a better service for residents.

Under the proposals, the existing unitary authority of Derby City would remain separate from the county authority, as it currently is.

As the council continues to develop its proposals, it is looking into ways to ensure strong local links would be retained through closer working with town and parish councils, and new local boards.

Independent research shows that having one new council on the current county council footprint whilst continuing to serve the same 800,000 residents would save an estimated £133 million over the first five years.

The council recently committed to getting residents views on the proposals. The poll – which cost less than £3000 – asked residents whether they agreed with “Keeping Derbyshire Together” under one unitary authority (excluding Derby City). Over 8,000 people took part in the poll, with 59% saying they agreed or strongly agreed with this approach.

Leader of Derbyshire County Council, Councillor Barry Lewis, said: “There is no doubt that one council on the current county council footprint would deliver better value for money for residents with fewer councillors and fewer senior officers. It will mean more money to invest in frontline services such as waste collection, road maintenance, housing services, children’s and adult social care – all things which matter to residents.

“In our view, this is the simplest transition as a new council would continue to serve the same number of residents as it currently does, just bringing more services together to make it less confusing for residents.

“Don’t let anybody tell you this would be some ‘mega council’ which is too big to serve residents, that argument simply doesn’t make sense.

“We already serve those 800,000 people and this step simply does away with a level we don’t need anymore, simplifying things for everyone.

“Residents have told me time and again that they find contacting their local councils confusing – whether it is for bin collections and household recycling, or leisure centres and libraries

“Under our proposals, we will explore better opportunities for more localised services for residents whilst still retaining that simple ‘one council contact’ for all. Better opportunities for residents could include, for example, a county-wide Derbyshire leisure pass or local planning area committees to ensure local planning and housing decisions are made at a very local level.

“Splitting Derbyshire into a North and South option with Derby City Council absorbed – like the proposals put forward by other councils in Derbyshire – not only splits the county up but risks the bulk of the business rates going into the south, and money being swallowed up by the city.

“Our proposal for one single county unitary aims to consider how resources can continue to be fairly shared across the whole county, including our rural communities, towns and villages. Derby City would continue to operate as its own unitary authority whilst we continue to serve the rest of the county, and we must stress, this is an only an interim proposal at this stage. We now look forward to the government reviewing the options and providing us with feedback to enable the council to progress to the next stage.

“Following feedback from government, we propose to publish more details about our proposals to enable us to further engage with residents and stakeholders over the summer period.”

A final proposal will be submitted to the government in November, with the government planning to undertake its own consultation.

In outlining its interim proposals, the council took into consideration the following factors.

Reduced public sector funding, increased inflation, increased demand for services driven by demographics and long standing social, health and economic pressures mean that councils continue to face significant challenges in providing the services that local people need and want with available resources.

The benefits of local government reorganisation in this context and on an appropriate and sensible scale, is clear. The council believes that to address these challenges and recognise the potential benefits of reorganisation, any proposal should meet a series of design principles.

Proposals should support local government in the area to:

Reduce costs through the rationalisation of executive and senior management teams and council assets.
Maximise local investments and provide economies of scale to protect vital services and deliver them more effectively.
Bring together local services onto a more rational and appropriate basis.
Improve the resilience of the Councils offer and ensure the long-term sustainability of local services across a sensible geography.
Provide simplicity through clearer lines and a single point of accountability and responsibility for local services.
Improve capacity and ability to make quicker decisions on local issues without navigating the roles and responsibilities of different authorities.
Drive through transformational change and fostering innovation to challenge the status quo to deliver modern and integrated services.
Enable further devolution of powers from Government strengthening the current deal, widening public sector reform further, and streamlining our delivery platform.

The interim proposal is evidence based and insight-led with democratic legitimacy, and we believe our solution is right for Derbyshire, recognising benefits against key principles including:

Scale – substantial size and mix of rural and other types of conurbations to offer equivalence, parity and competition to other local areas.
Simplicity – ‘Council mergers’ on existing county boundaries is the least complex option to implement and therefore represents the lowest risk.
Established delivery geography – The county council and its councillors are already responsibility for the majority of local government services with all district and borough councils collectively responsible for just 14% of total service expenditure.
Savings – Financial analysis demonstrates that reorganisation on county boundaries create the largest savings potential and lowest transitional costs. £133m as a net benefit after 5 years vs a two unitary model of only £45m.
Sustainability – A county unitary would support a larger and more diverse population, spread across urban and rural areas which is key to increasing regional resilience.
Disruption – Least disruption for residents and most service users, particularly those receiving social care, SEND support and children’s social services support. It is also the least disruptive for our public sector partners.
Identity – A whole county unitary council provides for the most common and dominant identity for Derbyshire.
Local Support – Engagement with Derbyshire residents show a significant majority support a single county unitary proposal.
Wider public sector – A county unitary provides the most effective, efficient and convenient model, as coterminous with other public sector agencies

There is also a clear disadvantage in disaggregating county council services, which would cost more, generate substantially less savings, risk the future sustainability for local services, and increase the degree of complexity and disruption for residents and for the Councils partners.

Indicative efficiencies and saving opportunities
A comprehensive independent financial analysis exercise of local reorganisation on county boundaries by PwC in 2020 and updated in 2025 concluded that larger authorities can save up to £2.8bn across all county areas over a 5 year reorganisation programme.

For Derbyshire specifically, it is estimated through the PwC analysis that a single unitary model for the county council area would save £133m as a net benefit after 5 years and the payback period of implementing a single unitary model would be less than a year. A two unitary model would save only £45m as a net benefit over five years and would cost around £6.6m more to implement (33% increase).

The analysis importantly also concludes that the ongoing net annual benefit after implementation for a one unitary model is £32m, in comparison to £16m in a two unitary scenario (50% decrease) – a premium payment to move to multiple authorities in a county area. This is shown in the table below.

One unitary/Two unitaries/Three unitaries