WE appear to have landed in the midst of a constitutional crisis lately, both nationally and locally.

Following Brexit’s two fingers up to our Continental cousins, we’ve lost both a defeated PM and the victorious leader of UKIP, while the Labour chief is clinging on by his fingertips to a Party which appears to be on the verge of disintegration.

And I don’t know about anyone else, but it feels to me as though the Lib Dems are a hazy memory - I couldn’t even remember their leader’s name without a helping hand from Google. (Tim Farron – remember him?)

Then of course, Scotland may decide to take the high road to independence, measles is making a comeback, rents are soaring and interest rates are practically in minus figures. It’s a Barnum and Bailey world, as they say.

And now the contagion of disarray has landed in our humble town of Swindon. We seem to be having a revolution. Only it’s not one anyone has voted for.

There’s been no uprising against the oppression of bureaucracy, no gnashing of teeth or organising of troops. No one seems to be rushing out into their backyards after Robot Wars to whip up a quick guillotine or knocking out a revolutionary flag or two after an episode of The Great British Sewing Bee.

Indeed, it is the bureaucrats themselves who are revolting (in more ways than one, you may say).

Having had enough of being a unitary authority, whereby Swindon Council runs all our services, the elected members seem to be careering towards a constitutional cataclysm which will see the creation of parish councils.

It is the biggest shift in Swindon’s political landscape for almost 20 years.

The new set-up will see the parishes responsible for grass cutting, street cleaning and a myriad of other essential services, while the borough council will retain responsibility for... erm... social care and planning... Even schools are being offloaded through the academy system, so it’s hard to work out what will be left for our current councillors to do.

Of course, there’s a lot to be said for parish councils – at their best, they are the grassroots of politics and the fundamental building block for democracy.

In practice, it’s an altogether more difficult kettle of fish.

If there’s one thing you can pretty much rely on in this country, it’s Joe Public’s apathy. You need look no further for proof than to the desperately low turn-out for elections. And all you have to do then is nip into a polling station or tick a box on a form and pop it in a postbox.

Parish councils rely on parish councillors to give up a significant amount of their spare time to tackle issues such as graffiti, overgrown verges, the state of cemeteries and the minutiae of day to day life which few people give a second thought to until something goes wrong.

Many struggle to find such altruistic individuals, let alone persuade a decent number of the electorate to summon the energy to vote for them. Which means members are often co-opted – which means they are voted for by the councillors currently serving the parish, not the public at all. It’s not democracy in its purest form, for sure, but needs must, I suppose.

But by far the biggest slap in the face this parishing plan represents is what Coun Jim Grant, the borough council’s Labour leader, called “a stealth tax”.

This extra new tier of local government means we will have to pay parish precepts on top of our current council tax – meaning some of us could face our council tax doubling in one fell swoop. Twice the bureaucracy, twice the price. Sadly, not twice the democracy or twice the spending. Call me cynical but it does feel as though the council is finding any means necessary to make up its losses after council tax was frozen for several years during the recession. And on top of this, children’s centres, libraries and other important services have been hacked to within an inch of their lives or wiped out altogether.

Money is tight – so let’s spend it on the services we need, not on setting up new layers of red tape.

  • TALKING of rip-offs, I’m a bit miffed by the announcement from the Beeb that we will now have to buy a TV licence whether we have a telly or not, so the golden age for those of us who only watch on playback on a computer is over.

I think we should bring back dog licences and make them compulsory regardless of whether or not you have a four-legged friend. Got a goldfish called Rex? Yep, you’ll need a dog licence for that. Do you sometimes pet other people’s dogs in the park? Mm-hm – that’ll be loads of money you owe us.

I appreciate the value of the Beeb – it makes some great programmes and it is indeed lovely not to have to watch adverts every 15 minutes.

However, other popular TV providers these days charge a monthly fee of roughly a fiver if you go for the basic deal. And you can cancel when you wish. Compare that to the BBC, which wants £145.50 of your hard-earned dough every year and threatens a whopping great fine or jail time if you don’t cough up. That’s over £12 a month – more than twice the price of competitors.

Apparently the Corporation has permission to go round in its spy vehicles checking up on whether we are watching its programmes online, although it promises it won’t check what else we’re doing on the internet.

I can’t help wondering that if the BBC really wanted to stop people watching its programmes online without paying for them, it could easily add a log-in page for viewers to enter their licence number. Or do they actually want to catch people out because the fines are a nice little earner?

  • SHAME on the thieves who targeted the Open Door Centre and made off with £2,000.

The charity, which helps people with learning difficulties reach their full potential, relies on these funds to carry on its work.

I hope the thieves are found and brought to justice and the money returned to the Open Door.

And I hope one day the culprits find themselves in need of a helping hand from such an organisation so they will learn the true value of these charities and the true depths of their selfish, odious crime.