There is nothing that a finance director dislikes more than uncertainty, and we have uncertainty like I have not seen in my career. We have just approved our medium term financial plan (MTFS) and this week I have ripped it up seeing income in freefall and COVID-19 related expenditure soaring.

I see my leadership role in this crisis, apart from being calm, as developing mechanisms for quick and safe decision making and providing clarity over how emergency processes can work. Our council now has an organisational shape that reflects the national resilience infrastructure with a core team making key decisions which are escalated from a set of cells each responsible for different aspects of this emergency.