Councillors accepted Labour’s proposals to merge all the county’s councils into a single combined authority and to establish a new mayor at its head akin to the first minister of a devolved nation.
It was also revealed during the meeting that the council’s push to be fast-tracked through the programme might entail the postponement of May’s local elections by 12 months.
After the vote, county council leader Nick Adams-King said: “We can’t influence the fact that this is happening. We might all be unhappy; we might all be upset; we might all be concerned for our residents.
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“But [the paper was passed] with a majority of 200 in parliament.”
The English Devolution White Paper, published last month, requires a statement of interest from councils by January 10 if they wish to be part of a Devolution Priority Programme.
This is the fast-track programme which would postpone the local elections should the Hampshire councils all agree to adopt it, a prerequisite of the formation of the combined authority.
However, while Southampton and Portsmouth have voted to adopt the programme, the Isle of Wight Council rejected it on Thursday, January 8.
There was considerable concern over the perceived threat to democracy the delayed elections might pose.
The leader of the county council’s Liberal Democrats, Councillor Keith House, warned that the last time an election was cancelled was during the Second World War.
He said: “If you ask the people of Myanmar and Bangladesh about cancelled elections, they’ll give you an answer.”
Other councillors, however, protested that Cllr House was exaggerating, reminding him that the elections would be postponed, not cancelled.
Another issue raised concerned Hampshire County Council’s “black hole” of debt, now tallied at £182m.
Those in favour of the combined authority hope costs will be cut, although many councillors doubted it would make matters better.
Liberal Democrat councillor Martin Tod said: “None of this can work or will work without a financial solution, and we have to speak out to the government.”
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He added: “We should be proud of our local government in Hampshire and stand up for democracy.”
This was echoed by Conservative councillor Peter Latham. He said: “The elephant in the room […] is finance. For me, finance is ultimately the issue that affects us all.”
He argued that the county council will become “unsustainable” if it continues like this. That point, he says, is getting “nearer and nearer”.
“I believe that we have to take the white paper by its face value and hope that it will deliver sufficient funding to make us sustainable, but I have my doubts,” said Cllr Latham.
Other councils across the South are also involved in discussions about devolution deals.
Should the plans go ahead, they would ultimately mean the creation of a strategic combined authority that moves power and money from Whitehall to local areas, probably with an elected mayor.