Did Peterborough City Council cuts leave a little girl bleeding?

And, fortunately, her six-year-old daughter Ellie-May can still do the same.

Ellie-May ended up in hospital and could have lost a finger after she hurt herself on a dilapidated see-saw in Welbourne Park in Werrington.

It was an awful incident and one that shouldn’t have happened.

A spokesman for Amey the company Peterborough City Council employs to maintain its children’s play areas, said: “We take the safety of the communities we serve extremely seriously, and we were very sorry to hear about this recent incident at Welbourne Park. We conduct weekly, quarterly and annual assessments of over 2,200 items of play equipment on behalf of Peterborough City Council to ensure they are safe for children to use.’’

Except this see-saw wasn’t safe for children was it?

Who assessed it? Stevie Wonder?

As can be clearly seen from the picture it is in a terrible state and should have been replaced long ago.

Obviously, that see-saw didn’t get in that state overnight. So when was it last assessed and what was the assessor’s verdict?

Peterborough City Council remains ultimately responsible. It was its decision to contract work out to Amey.

I suspect the sub-plot to all this is money, or rather the lack of it.

We are all aware how the Conservative government in Westminster has decimated funding to local councils.

Yet the Conservative council in Peterborough has boasted how it has managed the cuts and protected frontline services.

Children’s playgrounds are no doubt not classed as frontline services but surely cash pressures are at least part of the problem here?And if they are not how on earth has play equipment come to be left in this state?

The cut to Ellie-May’s finger should be a concern for us all.. and so should all the cuts made by the city council.

Rubbish service

My good friends at Amey and Peterborough City Council excelled themselves with their black bins service last week.

I returned home to find not only my own bin blocking my drive as usual but also my neighbour’s.

I look forward to the day I come home to a Jenga-style tower constructed from the entire estate’s collection of black bins.

Sham election

I’d like to declare this page a General Election-free zone, but I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep. Having witnessed the opening salvos I’m declaring it a sham election – Labour are shambolic and the Tories are shameless.

To err is human

I know I’m a contrary so and so but you won’t find me joining in the kicking of Peterborough City Council after it issued a warning to residents on social media about an energy company who were contacting residents.

Embarrassingly it turns out that the council is actually working with the company.

But mistakes happen and it’s clear that whoever penned this post had the purest of motives – to safeguard residents.

Free country

Our photographer is often at the sharp end of unhappy punters. Recently our snapper was taking what in the trade we call a “scene shot’’. He was confronted by a woman who threatened to call the police and told him to stop taking pictures as it was a “sensitive building.’’

I’ll spare the name of the company (and the feelings of the ‘sensitive’building!) but I feel duty bound to tell the PT readers that neither GCHQ nor MI5 have relocated to a Peterborough industrial park.

Perhaps the company in question should gently remind its employees that it is located in Great Britain not North Korea.