The Lord Mayor of Birmingham had her strict, no nonsense, head on at this week’s meeting of the full city council.

Anita Ward threatened to impose tough discipline on errant councillors, which seemed to strangely excite some people in the chamber.

Like many of her predecessors, Coun Ward is getting a little fed up with council members playing the standing orders game.

This is a problem faced by every public body in the land, from the smallest parish council to the likes of Birmingham, and involves councillors making spurious ‘points of order’ or ‘points of personal explanation’ in an attempt to massage their egos and have the final say in a debate.

In fact, there are almost no circumstances in which a point of personal explanation is permitted by standing orders.

What typically happens, however, is that Councillor A delivers a speech making a number of contentious allegations and then sits down, Councillor B responds to that speech by suggesting that Councillor A is a complete dolt and knows nothing about anything.

An enraged Councillor A then jumps to his feet insisting on making a point of personal explanation, which then sets off a chain of furious claims and counter-claims.

The Lord Mayor was having none of it.

“There is strict guidance about points of order and personal explanations which I will adhere to and rule anyone out of order, whoever they may be, if they are not within the guidelines,” she warned.

And in an attempt to avoid the unruly scenes that broke out at the October council meeting, when some over-excited councillors approached the Lord Mayor to remonstrate over the way a vote had been conducted, Coun Ward added: “If you have issues with the way I am conducting this meeting, I would suggest you don’t approach the rostrum.”

Having chanced her arm, the Lord Mayor continued with her new policy of shock and awe by stating that there must be no further abuse of question time.

This half-hour session is supposed to enable backbenchers to ask searching questions of cabinet members, but in Birmingham, just as sometimes happens in the House of Commons, there is a tendency for Tory and Lib Dem councillors to hijack the process by asking patsy, planted, questions of the executive.

“Question time”, the Lord Mayor began, “is not an opportunity for cabinet members to give reports”.

She continued: “This is an opportunity for straightforward questions to get straightforward answers.”

Straightforward questions and answers at a council meeting? This is a little like saying England has an opportunity every four years to win the World Cup. True as a statement of fact, but the end result is almost always bound to be bitterly disappointing.

Coun Ward might as well have saved her breath, for this week’s question time featured one of the strangest interludes ever witnessed in the council chamber, which is saying something.