I have noticed a significant deterioration in the streetscene where I live. I won’t name the local authority. Of course, as a commentator on the sector and having been a council chief, I understand the reasons for this – battered finances, rampant demand for adult and children’s social care and (in London at least) homelessness services, and senior management bandwidth compromised by the pandemic.

And yet…

Anti-regulation articles by council staff in the trade press almost never take the perspective of personally being a service user, and yet every writer will be one, to different degrees. I can understand wanting to defend local political choices over service delivery, and have done so myself. But as a resident in a council area, and a user of that council’s services, I want them all to be as good as they can be, if not better.