I sat for a while wondering how to tell this story – I wasn’t sure residents would believe me!.

We got an email today explaining that the Council has been cutting the grass of private landowners for free and will now stop doing.

It would appear that 2234 private properties have been having their lawns cut for free for years as a result of the complete incompetence of our Labour-run authority. When properties transfer under the right to buy, the garden also transfers, however unless residents tell the council to stop cutting the grass, it appears they carried on doing it! Now the housing stock has moved to separate ownership it seems all this has come to light.

Now you may think that I am making this up, but today is not 1st April its 1st March.

I did a few quick calculations. Assuming that the average gardener charges say £20 for cutting your grass, and assuming that this has been going on for at least 6 years, that works out at £4.289 million. However we all know that Durham County Council is not efficient, so it could have cost more !

It is however possible that some gardens could have been cut for longer than 6 years as the right to buy came in under the Tories under Maggie Thatcher. So just think – you might have been paying your council tax so one of your neighbours could get their grass cut for free for the last 30 years.

The incompetence of Labour and Durham County Council really does know no bounds. This is one cut I am happy to say I agree with!!