Eric Pickles: if urban myths are truth...?

Ah yes, Eric Pickles has dragged the 'Winterval' legend out for another airing, as a stick to beat local government with. As has been pointed out elsewhere, it's just a story, based on a strategic decision, more than a decade ago, to attract people into Birmingham by bringing together a collection of winter festivals under one banner.

But this latest outpouring merely continues a worrying tendency to focus on marginal issues as a means of disguising the very serious dilemma facing councils across the country. Here in the foothills of local government, I worry about balancing the books whilst maintaining local services. Luckily, getting the grass cut or not is unlikely to be fatal unless a villager suffers from really bad hay fever, and a loss of street lights might cause us all to drive with greater caution, but we'd get by somehow, I'm sure.

But there are big, philosophical issues nonetheless. In a time of austerity, how do you decide what to retain? Is potentially expensive investment to save future running costs something you can justify against a generally hostile opposition? Is contracting out of services merely converting a public, democratically accountable monopoly into a private, barely accountable one? Are there services which can be best described as the icing on the cake of public provision, and what, if any, are the social costs of axing them? And the biggest of all, does the target-driven culture of service provision add intolerable amounts to the overall cost?

And here, Eric is pretty silent. We traditionally haven't been, and our philosophy is, if Andrew Stunell is to believed (and I do), will shine through in the new Localism Bill. But it would really help if the case could be made by someone with a less knockabout manner, someone who uses his or her intellect to win arguments, rather than bluster.

So, let me wish Eric a very Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year, spending much more time with his loved ones in Brentwood and Ongar...