Chichester’s Mayor, Cllr Jean Lebourlier-Woods, has responded to the deaths of three members of the Royal Military Police, which has its headquarters in the city, by saying:
It is like losing members of your own family.
What?? These soldiers were not even based in the city. The Mayor almost certainly never met them. This is the worst sort of sound-bite statement you could imagine.
It is utterly correct that the Mayor should speak on behalf of the city council and the city people to express our condolences. It is also right that flags in the city should be at half mast, as a mark of respect to the dead and their families. But it is not right that we should have such pitifully trite pronouncements from the appointed leader of the local government.