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Motorcycle fiend Hazel Blears has roared her way into the top local government job in Government and will soon be taking her oily rag to councils up and down the country.

Government ministers have always enjoyed tinkering with the local government engine, adding or taking away a grommet here and there in the hope that the local body politic will one day win the annual TT and not sit rusting on the driveway of politics.

No-one knows yet whether Blears will be a tinkerer or a more loving tuner of the local government vehicle.

The chattering classes in the sector were quite taken aback by her appointment.  Ruth Kelly was always going to go after a lacklustre performance, but Hazel was never being talked up as a replacement.

Now that the news is sinking in, the general consensus appears to be that on balance Hazel Blears could be a Good Thing. 

Blears used to be a councillor up in the north east and for four years was Vice-president of the Local Government Association.  She has a history of taking a real interest in issues that are bothering councillors across the UK right now such as sustainable energy, community safety and policing.  Councils in her local area like her and think she will stick up for their interests.

As the red boxes get delivered to her kitchen, the one skill she will really need to have is speed reading. 

On her new desk and winking at her last week would have been the 16 bids for all purpose unitary councils for the shires, plus all the supplementary fluff that councils have been sending to her department over the last few days to bolster their arguments.

Will she burst the boil of this question and stick to making the decision at the end of this month?  Or take her time and leave the decision to the autumn at the earliest?

There is blood on the floor in council chambers across the country, thanks to the in-fighting and rows caused by the bidding process.  Will she really want more blood to flow and more lawyers to thrive by delaying things even longer?

One person whispering in her ear will be her new local government minister, John Healey, fresh for the Treasury and not a man to avoid the small print of life.

If any of the bids have financial holes in them, he is the man to spot them and there is no doubt that some of the quicker fix, hastily-assembled proposals will bite the dust shortly.

So will Hazel turn the throttle up or just throttle the project in its youth?  Watch this space. 

Paul.Masterman@blueyonder.co.uk