A public inquiry into reducing the board size of both Port Erin and Port St Mary Commissioners takes place in the latter’s Town Hall at 10am on Wednesday, July 3.

The boards decided separately to reduce in size.

Both currently have nine members but Port St Mary wants to go down to five while Port Erin wants seven.

The trend is for authorities to become smaller and others. Castletown and Braddan have already done so and there are plans for Douglas to drop from 18 councillors to 12.

The commissioners in Port Erin and Port St Mary have advertised the inquiry but Port St Mary went one step further and - as a reminder - distributed leaflets to households giving details.

Anyone who wanted to make representations at the inquiry had to make their submission in writing first and will be included at the discretion of chairman Geoff Karran.

The leaflets were delivered after the deadline for comments on June 10 had passed, so the deadline for comments about Port St Mary is now tomorrow (Friday) June 21.

The deadline for Port Erin has already passed.

The proposal was not unanimously supported by all commissioners.

Particularly vocal in his opposition is Port St Mary commissioner Laurence Vaughan-Williams.

He wrote to Stephen Willoughby at government’s local government unit: ’When I was first elected to the board, I was disappointed to discover that a group of the commissioners, which is now the majority, were in effect acting as a political caucus led by the present chair (Michelle Haywood).

’The reduction in board members will ensure that three members,make all the decisions of the village unchallenged. I do not believe that this is in the public interest. It cannot be right for commissioners to vote as though they were subject to a three-line whip.

He added: ’It is a dilution of the diversity and a dilution of the talent available to assist in reaching informed decisions. As a lawyer I find listening to the views of people with experience in fields other than my own extremely beneficial.

’In the brief period in which I was chair I was impressed by the varied knowledge of the other eight commissioners each of whom had valid contributions to make to policy decisions.’

Reducing both the board size and number of meetings ’is designed to ensure that decisions are merely rubber-stamped without adequate discussion’ he said.

He added: ’There is no need for two board meetings a month if certain commissioners have already determined the course of action and the vote to be taken in private prior to the board meeting as I suspect is the case.

’As one board member commented to me, "we are now only there to make up the numbers".

’Reduce those numbers to five and you might stifle any reasoned debate or potential opposition.’ He is also concerned that the proposed reduction would result in meetings being inquorate.’

In response Dr Haywood said: ’All the board’s decisions are made democratically. There is no caucus or block voting or conspiracy. Maybe Mr Vaughan-Williams is out of step with the rest of the board members.

’I am disappointed yet again he has taken his concerns to the media rather than discuss them at the board table or just made them to the chairman of the inquiry.’