DURING Tony Blair’s tenure as prime minister the North-East was given the opportunity to vote in a referendum to decide if it should have a devolved North East Assembly.

The people rejected that opportunity for an additional layer of bureaucracy and it was only then that I discovered there had been a quango entitled North East Assembly for several years.

Later, it was the Conservatives who wanted to have major areas called cities with one person overseeing the various council areas known as a mayor.

Ordinary cities were encouraged to enlarge their administration area and become larger organisations, such as Greater London (not the City of London Corporation which considers itself outside of the UK), Manchester, and a few others are now in the pipeline.

The North East of England was encouraged to become a city region, which is an oxymoron as the region has many cities within its boundaries, already and lots of mayors.

Fortunately, the councils did not agree to the overseeing mayor, as the region itself covered around 100 miles.

However, to even come to this stage, the councils formed the North East Combined Authority, and this still exists, as an extra layer of bureaucracy and I don’t remember the people of this region being asked if it was wanted or desired.

Even now, it is not completely clear on its website exactly how this organisation is being run.

Apparently it is has been in existence for a few years now, but do the ordinary people hear much about it or even know of its existence? How are the people chosen to be on this organisation’s committee? Or its staff? It is time we had some real transparency in governance today, at both central and local levels. Or is it that democracy truly is dead? Has democracy every really existed at all?

I have come to the conclusion that we are, and have been for many years, living in a dictatorship, but one that is too frightened to let the people know the true situation.

Carol Noble, Burnopfield