CREATING a single council for Norfolk - which would see Great Yarmouth Borough Council scrapped - could cost �42.1m. Details on potential costings of one-size-fits-all unitary authorities were released by the Boundary Committee last week.

CREATING a single council for Norfolk - which would see Great Yarmouth Borough Council scrapped - could cost �42.1m.

Details on potential costings of one-size-fits-all unitary authorities were released by the Boundary Committee last week.

It is estimated the super Norfolk council, one of two plans on the table, would cost �42.1m but make savings of �71.5m over three years. While the two unitary option of Greater Norwich and Rural Norfolk would cost �64.7m and make savings over four years of �83.7m. The Greater Norwich authority would need to share some savings with the Rural Norfolk unitary for both to recover costs.

Leader of the borough council Barry Coleman said: “I have no confidence whatsoever of anything that comes out of the Boundary Committee, and never will have.”

Mr Coleman said history showed unitaries were often more expensive to create than first predicted.

“The Boundary Committee can give us figures but that has no bearing on what happens because this is purely a political decision. It is a fact that one single authority will be cheaper to run but whether or not the savings are as they have estimated or can be made within the time scale is debateable,” he added.

Labour leader Mick Castle warned making savings would require strict leadership. He said: “Savings of reducing hundred of councillors and some chief officers are there of course, but the savings require proper stewardship. The councillors running the new authorities will be responsible for those savings and not frittering them away.

“I'm more concerned for getting the right deal for Yarmouth and at present this is not an ideal situation.”

A final decision on the shake-up will be made on July 15 by the secretary of state for communities and local government.