Ian Paul Politics Show BBC South

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Seera has 108 voting members

What exactly does SEERA do? Do you even know what SEERA is? Politics Show went out on the streets of Chichester to see if people could identify it.

We got a wide range of answers ranging from "A jewellers!" to "Is it a pop group?" Nobody we spoke to got the right answer."

Actually, it is the South East of England Regional Assembly, and according to its website it is "The Representative Voice of the Region".

So now you know. But does it do what it says on the tin?

It is made up of 74 councillors and 34 representatives of 'stakeholder organisations' like the South East England Faith Forum, the South East Sports Board and the CBI.

It has a staff of 36 and a budget of �4 m. It also has a responsibility to keep an eye on SEEDA, the South East England Development Agency.

So is SEERA the great hope to fill the democratic deficit locally?

Possibly not. Even its chair, Cllr Keith Mitchell from Oxfordshire County Council, wants to see it abolished. "We would scrap that organisation as being remote from the people."

New localism

So if a regional assembly is not the answer (and after the idea of elected assemblies was rejected in the North and North East last year it looks as if it is not), what is?

At the recent conferences, all three parties were talking about what is called the 'New Localism' - devolving power down to a really local level, possibly even more local than your council.

The hope is that people would be energised to get involved in local politics if they had real power. For the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, speaking at his conference, it has maybe another attraction:

"One day when I am asked by someone whose neighbourhood is plagued with anti-social behaviour; or whose local school is failing or hospital is poor, 'what are you going to do about it?'".

"I want to be able to reply: 'We have given you the resources. We have given you the powers. Now tell me what you are going to do about it'."

School governors

School governor shortfall Reading 15% (118 out of 782) Oxford 12% (552 out of 4292) Southampton 30% (c400 out of 1200) Brighton and Hove 14% (c60 short) Portsmouth 10% (100 out of 1089) Dorset 9 % (c200 out of 2400)

There is, though, a small problem. Sometimes when people are given the powers they turn out not to want to exercise them. Look at school governors.

The government has devolved a lot of authority and control to individual schools, making the role of parent governor more significant than it was in the past.

Yet there is a national shortage of people willing to be governors, with an average of 12% of places around the country unfilled.

School governor campaign

Here in the South, Politics Show has discovered, the picture is definitely patchy (see fact box).

The situation in Brighton got to such a point recently that they were advertising for governors on posters and on the local buses.

According to Janis Winkworth, the Governor Support Manager in Brighton and Hove: "Governors are always retiring or resigning and we are always trying to fill those gaps."

Janis Winkworth: Paperwork disillusions school governors

"We do an exit questionnaire when people leave. Two of the biggest reasons for people leaving are the amount of paperwork and the amount of time it takes."

Everyone seems to agree that local control and accountability is a good thing - except perhaps the people who would have to get involved in it. Us.

Politics Show

That is Politics Show, with Peter Henley, at Noon on 16 October 2005 on BBC One.

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