The hottest topic of conversation at this week’s Birmingham council cabinet meeting involved a relatively inconsequential decision, as is so often the case in politics.

Conservative and Liberal Democrat councillors are in a tremendous strop over the Labour administration’s decision to force District Committees to meet in the Council House.

Doesn’t sound like the end of the world, does it?

A simple guide to the great devolution row: the council used to have ten Constituency Committees responsible for running a few local services like parks and libraries. They met in the constituencies, usually in the evening. No one much went and the committees achieved very little other than overspending their sizeable budgets.

Labour council leader Sir Albert Bore has replaced these bodies with

Continues…