There was a story doing the rounds about the massively over-budget computer system which was intended to make Cheshire East and Cheshire West and Chester Councils more efficient.

According to the Guardian, the Best4Business project was designed to replace both councils’ ageing business IT systems with a new cloud-based network.

The two councils embarked on the joint project in 2016, and was initially expected to cost £11.8m.

But you know how these things go, the eventual cost was upwards of £25.1m due to delays and disagreements, along with the project essentially having to be restarted after both councils took over implementation from the developer.

Needless to say, some people aren’t happy about this despite council vowing to ‘learn lessons’ following a review of the seven-year project.

Unremarkably, one Conservative group has branded the project ‘a complete financial shambles’.

Seems like they may have a point with Cllr Neil Sullivan, finance spokesman for the Cheshire West and Chester Conservative group, saying: “From start to finish, and it isn’t over yet, this has been a complete financial shambles which will have a massive impact on local taxpayers.

“When all costs and expenditure are taken into account this IT project had an initial budget of £13.8m but has ballooned to some £30m if you include revenue from each council.

"The additional costs mean a liability for both CWAC and Cheshire East, shared 50/50, of some £16m. How on earth has this been allowed to happen?”

These seem like reasonable questions to me, but to be fair both Cllr Carol Gahan, cabinet member for legal and finance at Cheshire West, and Jane Burns, executive director for corporate services at Cheshire East Council, have put up a robust defence.

There have obviously been significant issues here and I wouldn’t for one minute pretend to understand how this has happened but having been involved in the implementation of a number of IT projects over the years I can state with some certainty that there is an equation that goes something along the lines of ‘the greater the number of stakeholders, the greater the number of problems’.

Which brings me to my main point. What we have here is one major project being implemented across two separate local authorities, two separate political organisations, two separate sets of officers, two separate sets of decision-makers, two separate budgets.

And laid out for all of Cheshire to see is the inherent flaw in local government in Cheshire.

Once Warrington and Halton were carved out of the ‘old’ Cheshire, there was a strong case to be made for the old Cheshire County Council to become the unitary authority, a single council.

Most of the set-up was already in place and would have provided economies of scale and staff cost savings that disappeared when the frankly ridiculous decision was made to set up Cheshire East and Cheshire West and Chester.

But we are where we and I suppose we’ve just got to suck it up and get on with it.

But stories such as this delayed, over-budget IT project shines a spotlight on the idiocy of having two councils for one Cheshire.

Now I fully realise that not everyone shares my view so if you can come up with a cogent and compelling argument about why I’m wrong, I’d be delighted to hear from you.

On another subject, I really do wonder what is wrong with some people.

I make this comment after looking at some of the headlines on the Guardian’s website.

Here’s a sample: ‘Man fined and banned from roads for driving and looking after child while drunk’; ‘Drink driver caught twice the limit banned from the roads for five years’; and ‘Woman banned from roads after being caught three times over cocaine limit’.

Generally speaking, I view myself as socially liberal. I have no problem with people having a drink or two and I’m certainly not part of the ‘flog em’ brigade.

But there does come a time when it is sensible to have a look at sentencing policies.

I am well aware that every case is different and that there may well be mitigating circumstances but the fact remains that every time someone gets behind the wheel of a vehicle while they are under the influence of drink or drugs, they are turning that car into a lethal weapon.

Maybe, just maybe, fines and driving bans are not enough.