Must have seemed like a good idea at the time

Eagle-eyed observers (and possibly even the local press) will have spotted that something is missing from next week’s meeting agenda of Swansea Council.

Conservative group leader & accomplished self-publicist, Rene Kinzett, was supposed to be tabling a motion that called on the council to organise consultation in advance of moves to introduce the post of an elected mayor.

Kinzett told the local paper that his proposal was to ask citizens on whether they generally liked the idea – although it would actually take a full scale referendum before the present leader & cattle cabinet arrangement could be dumped in favour of one that involves a mandated first citizen. The phrasing employed in the tory's motion is seen by several detractors as a sneaky but plausible sounding device intended to avoid the more arduous task of a stonking great petition bearing the signatures of at least 10% of the city’s registered electors.

Some betting is that council legal officers came to the same kind of conclusion and advised that the motion could not be accepted. Another theory doing the rounds however is that Kinzett could not even convince his own group to back the idea.