So a rumpus up in North West Leicestershire among the local Lib Dem branch wouldn’t have been newsworthy – if the national party hadn’t stepped in to shut it down.

I started chasing the story after hearing hazy reports that Coun Michael Wyatt had his membership suspended by his local party. Not quite true, it turned out. The executive had tried to but may have broken the rules. The national party then came in to shut them down. His membership remains untouched.

A morning of phonecalls turned up several conflicting accounts and the local branch appeared to be in confusion and a bit of chaos. I told the Lib Dem national office that this would be the only line I could run with unless we could get clarification of the situation fast.

Fair play to their press office, they fired out a statement saying the branch had been suspended, and I was right.

But then I hit a bizarre brick wall. Prospective Parliamentary Candidate (PPC) Professor Paul Reynolds, the man who’ll battle at the next election on behalf of the party and the branch, said he knew nothing about it.

He genuinely didn’t realise the extent of the situation. Even when presented with the party’s statement he insisted there must have been some kind of misunderstanding.

Right up until 5pm on Tuesday he maintained that it was a misunderstanding. He promised to contact Lib Dem HQ – top brass, no less – to clear up the situation.

I told him I’d leave my mobile phone on all night. The story could always be pulled if we got confirmation that it was simply not true, but the call never came.

Prof Reynolds clearly believed his account of the situation which makes the situation even more bizarre: The PPC in a high-profile election battleground was unaware that his local branch had been shut down by the national office.

Perhaps the original line of “chaos and confusion” wasn’t so far off the mark…