The firm line being taken with Bradford Council by Local Government Minister Stephen Byers over changes to the way the authority is run is bound to encourage those who are less than happy with the way the matter has been handled.

He clearly accepts the core of their argument: that although the option of maintaining the status quo of a council leader and executive committee received most backing in the recent consultation exercise, there was even more support for an elected mayor when the votes for the other two options were added together.

Mr Byers echoes the views of those who seek a referendum when he says that the Council did not take full account of the consultation when it decided to stay with the same system. It was not a simple matter of first past the post, which is how the authority chose to interpret it.

The consultation exercise was just that. It was not a referendum. The people of Bradford should now be given the opportunity to vote on this important issue. Enough interest has been shown in it to merit a referendum. Mr Byers has made clear that is the way the Government sees it. Bradford's elected councillors will lose the trust of the electorate if they fail to give them a chance to have their say.

Whether an elected mayor would be right for Bradford is not the issue here. At the end of the day, the people of the district might even make it plain that they don't want one. The issue is that whatever the decision turns out to be, it should be they who make it and not the Council.