It’s a truth universally acknowledged, as Jane Austen should have written, that no one likes changes to their bins.
Few things in life get people’s goats more than altering when or how their rubbish gets picked up.
In Dundee, as you’ll no doubt be aware, the city council has been issuing new bins, with large Eurobin style dumpsters clogging up pavements and roads across vast swathes of the city.
Residents have also been given new burgundy bins to increase recycling rates.
All this is, environmentally speaking, a good thing but tends not to go down too well with householders who have to find space for yet another bin or will discover new obstacles confronting them on the pavement.
But if there is unhappiness over new bins, it certainly wasn’t reflected in last week’s council elections.
Yes, the Tories picked up two seats at the expense of the SNP in the West End and the Ferry but it seems if Dundee voters are a conservative bunch, it’s with a small “c” rather than a capital one.
In all, only three out of 29 council seats changed hands.
Given the freakish nature of the 2012 result when the SNP returned all 16 of its candidates, it’s probably fair to assume this a reversion to the norm rather than Scotland’s Yes city tiring of the SNP, even if the party no longer has its majority.
It was SNP candidates who picked up the most first preference votes in six of the city’s eight wards.
That is, no matter how you look at it, a ringing endorsement of the SNP’s record since they took control of the council.
But it wasn’t just the SNP whose vote held up. Labour might have lost one councillor in the Ferry but sending nine back to the City Chambers is a pretty big win given the travails of the party nationally.
Meanwhile, Fraser Macpherson and Ian Borthwick both retained their seats, demonstrating that doggedness and diligence can still trump party politics in individual constituencies.
While few seats changed hand there will be few new faces in the City Chambers. Both Labour’s Michael Marra and the SNP’s Anne Rendall are savvy operators while the enlarged Conservative group will be looking to makes its presence felt over the next five years.
Whatever shape the new administration takes, it will be responsible for delivering on the promise of the V&A and the Tay Cities Deal.
Otherwise, last week’s victories won’t mean much at all.
