Local administrations: France and Scotland

 

Regional specialities, clockwise:
carbonade maison, potjevleesch, poulet au Maroilles (a local cheese), 

The French countryside was not as I remembered.  Big Amazon-style warehouses dominated the flat landscape around town.  We were driven out to a retail park to 'Beers & Co', a chain, apparently, where the decor could have been anywhere in America but the food, or at least some of it was French, even regional and good (see photo).

I asked the mayor of the right-leaning town about it.  This was a former mining area, he said. We need the business.  The village where we were staying had a vending machine for baguettes.  I could hardly believe my eyes, but he was practical. If it isn’t profitable enough to have a boulangerie here, it’s the next best thing, he said.  Why?  Piped up one of the children? Well, for people who can’t get about, came another pragmatic answer.

France has long had a tug-of-war between centralisation, dating back to Louis XIV and the country's regional identities that find expression most famously in food and dialect. Administration in the area we visited was radically decentralised, compared to Perth and Kinross in Scotland. The mayor of the French town presided over 5000 souls, was paid alongside his day job in the professional classes and had several maire-adjoints, also paid, alongside their day jobs to help him. This mayor had been canny.  All his maire-adjoints were chosen by him and specialised in whatever they were experts in in their day jobs.  So when someone challenges us we can point to our day jobs, and say "I am a professional in this field, are you?"  Whereas in the next town, the woman in charge of security was a teacher.  In Perth and Kinross, the councillor heading up the powerful Environment and Infrastructure committee which decided the road and building decisions for an area over 2000 square miles. Most recently this person is a retired army officer.  Before that, it was a photographer. 

In that small town in France thirty elected councillors, some of whom also have specialised functions assist monsieur le maire, who has a budget and power.  I spend my time calling people to try to get money for grants and special projects on top of what we are allocated, he said. 

- Alors, il s'agit des relations, des contacts, quoi ?
- Oui, c'est ça.
- Ils viennent ici, ces gens-là, pour voir la ville ?
- S'ils veulent venir ici et manger dans le meilleur restaurant, c'est ce qu'on va faire.

So it was about contacts and wining and dining if necessary, to get the grants.

In Perth and Kinross, forty elected councillors decide the fate of the region, some 150,000 citizens.  The day to day running of the region is done by several thousand unelected operational and administrative council staff.  Villages towns and "community councils", voluntary organizations that are set up by law by the Local Authority. They are the most local tier of statutory representation in Scotland.  In our region they famously have no power, meaning that decisions are made on behalf of villages and towns across the region by the centralised authority whether the local communities like it or not.  The region's community councils passed a vote of no confidence in the Chief Exec back in 2009 but nothing has changed. 

Administratively, there was a déséquilibre in the twinning exchange.  I felt culturally there was too though there was nothing but excellent good humour, kindness and interest from the French.  The men in our party drank (beer) far more than the French and bragged about Scottish drinking culture in a way I found embarrassing and not what we should be exporting. They ordered Mcdonalds to eat and cooked only twice - once burgers, the other time sausages at 2AM in the middle of a 5 hour late night drinking session.  Astonishingly, the French took it all in excellent good humour and seemed to love having them there. Maybe because beer drinking is a big thing in that part of France.  Undoubtedly the kilts and and the bagpipes helped.