Sheffield council pulls back from the brink... or does it?

When Nicole Jewitt posted on the It’s Our City! Facebook page on Tuesday, it was her last throw of the dice. “Sheffield, surely we’re better than this,” wrote Jewitt, who, as well as being a long-time community activist, is also the owner of Cole’s Corner, the popular bar and record store on Abbeydale Road. “I’m struggling to understand how we reached this point.”

In its plaintive tone, it sounded like a recognition that the coalition was over. After five years of working as partners, both with and without the Lib Dems, the Labour-Green alliance was to be detonated. It had withstood changes in leadership at both parties, and held even as opposition to the local plan reached fever pitch. But events in the Middle East were about to bring it down.

Listening to the party leaders earlier this week, it seemed impossible that things would be patched up. “Trust in Sheffield Greens is completely broken”, said Labour leader Fran Belbin, telling us the plan was to go it alone from now on. “If Labour want to bully their supposed partners on this, what will they do in future?” Green leader Angela Argenzio asked us, adding that relations had been “strained for some time”.

And yet, two days later, there was the mother of all screeching u-turns. Suddenly, the two parties weren’t consciously uncoupling at a rate of knots. Instead, they were preparing to renew their vows.

We’ve made it our mission this week to understand: how did we get here? And — after the war of words that has raged in recent days — can the parties really continue to govern together?