VOTERS in West Devon are to choose whether or not they wish to be governed by an elected mayor.

Borough councillors meeting in Tavistock on Tuesday decided by 15 votes to 10 to hold a referendum on the issue.

Most councillors felt an elected mayor and cabinet was inappropriate for a borough like West Devon and preferred the option to modernise and streamline the current committee system — and could legitimately have chosen that.

But the new legislation for the modernisation of local government allows a referendum to be called any time in the next five years if 2,000 voters were to demand it.

Rather than face that uncertainty councillors opted to hold a referendum this winter.

Conservative group leader Cllr Dick Eberlie said: 'I see councillors elected as representatives of their communities. We come together because we want to speak for the people who have elected us, to get the best deal for them. We don't come together to promote political points, or as managers of the borough.'

He doubted the issues could be adequately explained in a simple referendum question and recommended the council went ahead immediately with improving the current system, based on results of previous consultations.

Liberal Democrat Cllr Noel Cartwright said a referendum would settle the issue for at least the next five years, when the option to change the system could arise again.

Otherwise, he said, it would be easy for any group to raise the 2,000 signatures necessary to force a referendum.

'That would leave us in an uncertain position, we would never know when it was coming,' he said. 'I believe we can get a no vote, but we need to settle the issue firmly.'

Cllr Cartwright said two thirds of those so far questioned wanted change — a referendum was an opportunity to extol the advantages of a streamlined committee system.

'If we do lose, it will be the will of the people. Sixty-seven per cent of the people want change. To ignore that would be wrong.'

Cllr Roger Mathew was in two minds. He said holding a referendum would knock the issue on the head for the next five years, otherwise there would be a 'sword of Damocles' hanging over the council.

'But I think it is a complete waste of time to hold a referendum,' he added. 'There is no case for a directly elected mayor and cabinet for a district like West Devon. It will not work and people will end up with a dictatorship.'

Cllr Ted Sherrell criticised the mayor and cabinet system: 'It is alien to the British system, which, even with all the warts, is still a good system — people will have to think hard before changing that.

'A cabinet system is not as democratic as the present system — one only has to look at the USA. It is open to corruption.'

He supported the call for a referendum: 'This would be democracy being seen to be done.'

Cllr Peter Hill was critical of the Government's desire to make massive changes, regardless of what worked and what did not.

'I feel very strongly this is a boil that has got to be lanced, a problem that has to be addressed, and addressed quickly to get it out of the way for the next five years.

'People have the right to decide how they are going to be governed, we are giving them that chance,' he said.

The proposals have to be submitted to the Government by September 14 — the date delayed because of foot and mouth. Councillors have asked for a special meeting to thrash out — as far as the law allows — the wording of the question.

The referendum will be carried out by post, which councillors saw as the best way to achieve the most democratic result, sometime between November and March.

In the event of a 'no' vote for an elected mayor and cabinet, the fall-back position would be an improved and streamlined committee structure with the ceremonial mayor.

Two other options — variations on the elected mayor theme — have been ruled out.