Bats put sell-off plans in a flap

We’re informed that reasonable sounding tones in today’s Western Mail about a development rethink caused by habitat concerns belie the real extent of anger within cash-strapped Swansea Council.

Senior cabinet figures reportedly went bat-shit on learning that one of their money-raising plans to sell off the Belvedere had been screwed by planners – or at least ecologists working in the planning department. The row is said to have worsened an already fractured relationship between forthright John Hague, who holds the environment portfolio, and his more invertebrate colleagues.

The alleged response by Lib Dems, according partisan sources, is a vow to make sure that a proposed internal cull of service heads has the ‘right effect’. Unsurprisingly, the same sources predict that any savings will be overshadowed by a succession of very expensive employment tribunals.

(CS)