The district council agreed to spend up to £40,000 on taking part in the Government’s “super council” consultation, including potentially lodging a legal challenge against plans.

Members of Chiltern District Council (CDC) met on April 11 to discuss the next steps after county council plans to scrap the four district councils and create one ‘super authority’ were backed by Government last month.

It was proposed that the council, which submitted its own proposal for two unitary authorities in Bucks, should set aside £20,000 on making representations to secretary of state for local government, Sajid Javid, before the public consultation ends on May 25.

However councillor for Cholesbury, The Lee and Bellingdon, Nick Rose, feared the amount would not be enough to “cover the council’s immediate requirements” and called to double the sum.

South Bucks District Council met on Monday evening and agreed to set aside £20,000 for the same reasons.

The two district councils decided that action should be taken to “protect the best interests” of south Bucks residents regarding the Government’s decision to back plans – including seeking legal advice, lodging legal challenges and communication campaigns.

Leader of CDC, Isobel Darby, urged residents who “care about the future of local services” to send their views to Government.

She said: “We don’t believe a single county-wide unitary authority for Bucks is in the best interest of our local residents.

“We are extremely concerned about a ‘one size fits all’ approach which would be too distant and remote from many of our residents, meaning that key decisions affecting the delivery of our services could be made with limited local representation.

“We want local people to know that they can have a say about the plans for Bucks and that the ‘minded to’ decision on a single county-wide unitary authority for Buckinghamshire is not set in stone”.

However leader of the Liberal Democrats on CDC, Peter Jones, said plans for two unitary councils are “bonkers”, adding that “nobody really cares as long as their bins are collected”.

He said: “To say there is no widespread support for change is probably true, but there is no widespread support for the status quo either.

“Nobody really cares as along as their bins are collected, and we all know that.

“The idea of having two small unitary authorities strikes me frankly as bonkers. Are we really going to have two education departments? Two social services departments? Two transport departments?

"It doesn’t sound like that will be a solution to the problems we have in our county.”

Residents are urged to send their views to email sajid.javid@communities.gsi.gov.uk.