The sun is shining, the festival is fast approaching, the roads are getting busier and the Isle of Wight Council is having a crisis… happy summer everyone! 

I’m writing this on Sunday evening, so lord only knows who will be running the Island by the time this goes to print. 

With rumours rife about members crossing the floor and a crumbling majority for Lora Peacey-Wilcox’s Independent-led alliance… is anyone else getting 2017 vibes from County Hall at the moment?

Remember when Jonathan Bacon stepped down and effectively handed control over to the Tories before losing his seat at the next election in what is now quite a tradition for Isle of Wight Council leaders (Pugh, Bacon, Stewart)?

Are we on the cusp of a change at the council or is this just a stunt by a couple of disgruntled members desperate to get their names in the paper?  

Times are tough, the over-tightened purse strings of our local authority budget have been sold off at a purse string auction with the vain hope of raising a couple of extra pennies.

Our council leader has had to resort to surreptitiously leaving postcards in Michael Gove’s bag begging for more cash.

Maybe Bob could roll up his sleeves and help? He seems very busy on GB News so he might not have time… 

The council’s press team are doing their classic tactic of announcing that some schools are going to close only to change their minds a few days later.

It helps keep everyone on their toes and reminds us that there is actually someone in charge of education sitting on the council.

They are also preparing for a shake up of departments by merging a couple together and giving them a ridiculously vague title like ‘Places’ or ‘Dreams’ so no one really knows what they are for or what they are actually supposed to do.

I saw the fabulous performance of Beyond the West End at Shanklin Theatre the other day (highly recommend).

During their version of the song If I Were Not Upon the Stage they each perform hilarious turns in different job roles from delivering exercise classes to trimming next door's bush.

Then, one of the performers portrays someone who works for the council. He moves incredibly slowly and sips on some coffee, not really doing a lot!

Now, I know there are tons of incredibly hard-working council employees who do a cracking job every day but why does everything move so slowly? Is it the system? Is it interference from cabinet members? Is it really that complicated? 

And at town level, things are even worse. It’s a postcode lottery. Ryde solves all its problems by covering it in palm trees and hoping no one notices how awful the new interchange looks.

Ventnor is refusing to change anything because someone printed Keep Ventnor Weird on a tea towel and it is now the go-to angry response whenever anyone wants to make any alterations, however beneficial that may be.

Are we Levelled-Up yet? Does the council feel like the Island is fully regenerated and we can move on?

We’ve got new stickers for our bins… is that all we can hope for for the rest of the year?