At a recent public protest in the city that called upon Leicester Labour councillors to refuse to carry through cuts to local services, I was approached by a longstanding Labour councillor who attempted to explain to me why Leicester’s Labour-run City Council has no alternative but to carry through Tory cuts. She explained that managing the city’s dwindling budget was best viewed as being like the problems an individual might face with managing your own personal finances. You have a limited amount of money to spend (income from your employment) which must match up with your household’s outgoings (expenditures, food, bills, etc): if the two do not match up, you end up going into debt — which, the councillor explained, she personally preferred not to do.

But if we accept the proposition that running the Council is like running a household, then the Tories massive reductions in local council funding…