The front room, like for many others during this coronavirus lockdown, has become the office for me on what is now my seventh week of working from home. For somebody who spends the majority of his working time at council meetings, the cancellation of all meetings (and here comes that worrying word) indefinitely, because of social distancing measures, had me concerned that the story well could be drying up a bit for me.

Nevertheless, we got to now and what has been the council’s, at least in these unprecedented times, first virtual meeting. So in I tuned from the comfort of my settee in shorts, no shoes and a lockdown beard. And what can I say? It went well. In a very niche, reporting-on-the-council kind of way, it was one of those ‘I was there’ moments… See? See what spending all this time inside does to a person? See what it makes you start thinking?

To somebody who has had more than a fair share of fallouts with technology in the last two months, a few hiccups would have been expected. A few arguments with computers, a few lost connections. But, pleasingly, it went very well. Smooth as you would like. Debates ran, decisions, albeit not on the most controversial applications, were reached, everyone had, at least to my ears, a say. There was a bit of cut out and a few councillors resorting to miming decisions but overall, everyone was happy.

Perhaps it was the unusual circumstances that kept the virtual muzzle on Cllr Alan Amos, who usually spends at least one Thursday a month soliloquising in the Guildhall, but was now reduced to one mere dig at the SWDP in what was, by all means, a tranquil meeting.

It was the new armchair democracy in action and the way things are going to be, for at least a while, I think.

I think politics needs its outlets, it needs a bit of theatre and it will always need the ability to debate, but that might need to take place through different means in the future.

It might take a bit of getting used to but I think when we come out of these times and look back at how society has changed and how we are now living, how we work and how we spend our time, this might be an avenue worth exploring. More virtual meetings, more online. It might just be a way around things for the moment, but it could be the way to go in the future.