Perhaps I should also add that political interference in processes from all sides has made things much more difficult at local level over the years. I worked 30 years under Tory and Labour governments and Labour GLC and both Labour and LibDem councils in Southwark. Constant policy changes as well as an incredible amount of new regulations via government and EU resulted in seemingly never-ending administration which for the vast majority of processes was filed away and eventually shredded or kept never to see the light of day. Look how well that worked for Grenfell.
Under Blair's government this was ramped up to ridiculous levels with the number of PFIs that were taken on, which to councils cutting staff regularly just became impossible to administer. The Tories went even further and the result was that tranches of PFI schemes were given out in 'job lots' to one contractor. The one that resulted in my redundancy/retirement package was 12 school refurbishment/new builds awarded to Balfour Beatty in 2012, these included facilities maintenance contracts which took my job. It doesn't matter who is running things the whole set up of awarding contracts is riven with the same companies who all have cosy relationships with whoever is responsible, it's how it's always been and nothing will change, just look at how both the Tories and Labour successively have f*cked my local council Croydon to the point of bankruptcy...
