On a glacial Wednesday morning in early February, 10 new contestants gathered in Barking Town Hall for the start of the 2018 Local Government Challenge – now entering its ninth year – and the opportunity to win the coveted £10,000 Bruce-Lockhart Scholarship.

With a tough five challenges ahead in councils up and down the country and no idea what to expect over the next 24 hours, there was an undercurrent of nervous excitement in Committee Room 2 as the Local Government Association's (LGA) Claire Holloway welcomed the contestants and divided them into teams. Among the line-up was the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government's Peter Sebastian, who became the first central government representative to join the competition.