Where there's muck there's brass a plenty

Is it just me or does anyone else think that councils, Government and the hundreds of bodies which have been given some sort of official standing are all getting a bit too big for their boots - boots remember that we are actually paying for.

The bin bag bonanza coining in £50,000 a year in Birmingham is just a symptom of the wheel clamper mentality that seems to run through our town halls and Government departments. Perhaps it is time for the old council to get back to basics and just do the things we are paying them for rather than festivals for one-legged jugglers and delivery units delivering things no one has ever even asked for.

Government too has this idea that it is a plc, with a need to charge for everything and make a profit, forgetting that we are the shareholders of course, and instead of a new initiative for every news bulletin might do better to dump all the airy fairy ill conceived big ideas and just do what we are paying for.

All we ask for is that our children are educated to a decent standard, our elderly are looked after without having to sell their homes, our streets and homes are safe, our roads are well lit and not full of potholes, our public transport system is both cheap and a public service and our health service gives us the best treatment, and best chance os survival, available. Oh, I almost forgot, rubbish collection comes into the deal as well. It does not seem a lot to ask for the ever increasing amounts we are forced to pay.