It is not very often that the leader of a political party publicly admits his team got it wrong, but that is exactly what David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative Party in the United Kingdom, has recently done. In his manifesto-like paper 'The Permissive Society' (2006), in which he outlines his thinking on a new social philosophy, Cameron discusses the apparently sorry state of local government and comments that 'there is a renewed need for greater local fiscal autonomy and for strong

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... c institutions'. In discussing how this need arose he further notes, reflecting on the Conservatives' last period in office, that 'we Conservatives must accept our share of the blame'.