Now the dust is settling, the Boris burqa-gate saga is worth reflecting on in terms of one core issue for councils: social cohesion.

I fear one of the consequences of the recent row is that we may all have become mealy-mouthed. What can, and can't we say, in tackling some of the challenging problems we encounter in what home secretary Sajid Javid has described as a country ‘divided on religious, racial and socio-economic lines'?