If there was a monument to past failures in local government, One Angel Square would be it. On face value, it's a light, airy, modern office block, with a wide central atrium and gleaming surfaces. But in reality, it is the £53m folly, built by Northamptonshire CC in the midst of its financial collapse, sold and leased back to the council as part of the rescue bid.

The folly is the headquarters' farcical omission: it is a council building with no chamber. To embark on the democratic process so central to local government, councillors must traipse back to the near-derelict, abandoned county hall.