Sorry: Sheffield's tree butchers plead forgiveness - but why now?

It read like Bjørge Lillelien’s impromptu football commentary - wise readers will recall: “England - the home of giants: Lord Nelson; Lord Beaverbrook; Sir Winston Churchill; Sir Anthony Eden; Clement Attlee; Henry Cooper; Lady Diana. We've beaten them all! Maggie Thatcher can you hear me?”

Those pseudo-historic references may seem far-fetched, but are useful in articulating the siege mentality adopted by Sheffield City Council as it lost sight of its responsibilities and took more seriously its power and authority over service and duty.

That Sheffield City Council has found it within itself to apologise - now - for ransacking its own backyard, in the process driving a schism of mistrust between a local authority and those it serves - which may never be bridged - is as predictable as it is unforgivable.

This newspaper only had to take a cursory glance at the evidence supplied by residents - do not call them campaigners - worried about what was happening to know, absolutely know, that something was wrong.

You didn’t need to be Jessica Fletcher to detect the rot; it wasn’t in the trees, it was within the council. A combination of egotistical politicians without a brain cell between them and an executive too scared to say no.

All the while, they chose to lie, obfuscate and mislead. Some news outlets chose to let them do so. Not this newspaper. One apology read: “We would like in particular to apologise for repeatedly saying in the media, and in correspondence, that there was no target for the tree replacement programme, that felling was always a last resort and that any change to the tree replacement programme would result in catastrophic costs. It is clear that this was not the case.”

The Yorkshire Post stated as much at the time. Others simply relayed their message.

The apology added: “Knowledgeable people and organisations, who the council could have worked with were ignored. This was exacerbated by failures to meet information requests; we withheld too much information for too long.”

This newspaper knows all of that, all too well.

One has to wonder: what else did Sheffield Council, at that time, get so wrong? Pruning the hedges is hardly rocket science in comparison with running schools, health, social care and more. Are they bullying everyone?

It says not. In that statement is claims: “Five years on, the council is already a very different place.” It stopped short of claiming it was a better place, but did insist it had learned from its mistakes.

But, for this newspaper – for now - that apology is worth about the same as the lies that council told about the journalists – working for this newspaper – who knew that council was failing. Whilst so many other news outlets were willing to give Sheffield City Council airtime to contradict incontrovertible evidence that it had gone to hell in a hand cart, we stood firm.

Signatories to the apology, Leader Tom Hunt and Chief Executive Kate Josephs said this: “Failing and making mistakes is a part of life, but refusing to listen and learn is a mistake we can never repeat.”

We told you so, over and over again. We tried to protect the city and its reputation, yet we were blamed for the contrary. Trust you? We’ll see.