There seems to be an end of term feeling creeping in amongst the city council’s leading lights as the Tory-Lib Dem administration enters what is widely expected to be the final few weeks of its eight-year reign over the UK’s largest local authority.

More than one senior officer has remarked in recent weeks that decisive action is getting harder to come by and new initiatives are a rarity.

One crucial decision for the city’s economy which seems destined for the long grass is the relocation of the Wholesale Markets.

This was supposed to be taken in November, deferred until January in the wake of widespread opposition, but is still nowhere near a Cabinet agenda.

It is a similar story for the scrutiny committees which, even if they achieve little, like to keep themselves busy by poking their noses into various areas of council policy and shining a light on them.

Notable exceptions have been the housing committee which seems to have the bit between its teeth over gas central heating service contracts and the finance committee, which this week launched a fresh inquiry into the council’s use of bailiffs.

There is a huge imperative to chase down the tax dodgers as budgets are very tight and the city council has recently entered into a new council tax recovery contract with Capita-run Service Birmingham.

But it seems that a few councillors’ inboxes are stuffed with complaints from residents who say they are being unfairly hounded by the debt collectors chasing unpaid council tax.

The Birmingham Post newsroom regularly receives similar complaints from readers, but too often the evidence is not strong enough to satisfy our lawyers and as a spokesman for one debt collection agency, Equita, pointed out: “there will always be complaints when you are asking people to pay money they do not want to pay”.

But one who is not afraid to speak out is the Tory backbencher Graham Green, a man who does not mind ruffling a few feathers among colleagues of all political colours.

During his evidence he called the bailiffs “bullies” and “mercenaries” and referred to cancer patients and vulnerable old folk who had been hounded for just a few pounds of outstanding tax. It was gripping stuff.

It was made even more compelling when he admitted that his day job for British Gas sometimes involves forcing entry into the homes of those defaulting on their fuel bills to install pre-pay meters.

“I do it legally,” he pointed out.

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Equita should be warned that Coun Green is a tenacious man, not easily swayed from his path and not afraid of making enemies.

In the last few months he has managed to outrage binmen by calling them lazy and dismissed the entire town of Tamworth as dirty.

Followers of council question time will know him as the Dolphin Centre man. For four consecutive meetings he has challenged the Labour chairman of Hodge Hill constituency, Ansar Ali Khan, on the centre.

It is a former Sea Cadet base in Ward End Park which was given a Changing Rooms-style refit and makeover by young Conservative volunteers during the Tory party conference in October 2010.