Last week, Duncan Smith came in for fierce criticism after he accused Enfield council of failing to adequately manage funding cuts when it faced a backlash to plans to cut youth services. In what Doug Taylor, the leader of Enfield council, describes as an incredibly ill-informed and inappropriate intervention, the minister told the Enfield Independent:

“If you look at the successful local authorities, they are the people who have worked out what the vitally important things are that they do, and have managed to get through this process without savaging the things that really matter. My only advice to local council[s] is that if you get the balance right, you should be able to manage this in a way that is not headline news – doing it with better efficiency. It is like any company, you always face the issue of whether what you spend outweighs what you earn. Headline cuts are not the way to go.”

That such a senior and high profile member of the cabinet – with no official brief for local government – has ostensibly suggested that councils could avoid gruelling financial situations if only they were better at managing budgets, has understandably angered local politicians.

In the case of Enfield, which has had to make savings of £118m since 2010 – 49% in real terms according to a council spokeswoman – Duncan Smith’s proclamations are an affront.

Taylor insists that Enfield, like councils all over the country, has gone to great lengths to increase efficiency before even contemplating cuts to frontline services. He says the annual funding the council receives from central government has been cut by an average of £700 for every household in the borough in the past five years, and that efficiencies are no longer enough. “The £56m we need to find [as a result of the last spending review] is more than we currently spend annually on cleaning the streets, collecting the bins and lighting our streets,” he says.

Local MP Joan Ryan is particularly scathing of the secretary of state’s statement. “Iain Duncan Smith knows nothing about Enfield – that much is clear,” she says. “IDS should get his facts right, given his local authority – Waltham Forest – has also made substantial cuts. I recommend less sermonising and a better understanding of his own policies.”

Enfield’s population is rising, like many other parts of London, pushing up demand for local services and making the financial juggling act of delivering more with fewer resources even harder. Duncan Smith’s ill-informed pontifications, Taylor says, are an exercise in power without responsibility; it will be interesting to see if the MP takes Taylor up on an open invitation to visit the council and see for himself what is actually going on.

It’s bad enough that Duncan Smith is using his position to hammer councils on efficiency when he hasn’t discussed the facts with them, but let’s also not forget the impact of welfare reform. Benefit policy upheavals, for which he was architect-in-chief, have contributed immensely to the increased demand for support from local authorities just when they’re least able to provide it.

Oh, and don’t forget either that when Cameron needed to avert a backbench rebellion and magically found a £300m pot of cash to chuck at Tory councils, there were no assertions that they should improve their budget management skills instead.