Beleaguered Birmingham City Council workers have been given the Gareth Malone treatment 鈥 with the formation of a morale-boosting choir.
The council is one of five workplaces taking part in the new BBC2 series The Choir: Sing While You Work.
Next Monday鈥檚 episode features choirmaster Malone auditioning hundreds of council workers, from grave diggers to pest controllers and even the chief executive, to form a choir of 22 singers.
They range from a traffic warden to the director of families and young people services.
And he soon realises that for some of the members whose jobs are at risk, it could be their swansong.
He learns that the biggest local council in Europe employs more than 40,000 staff but is in the middle of reducing its budget by 拢650 million.
Malone chooses children鈥檚 social worker Siobhan Patton as the soloist when they perform the 1988 hit The Only Way Is Up by Yazz and the Plastic Population.
She finds the lyrics particularly poignant and appropriate to her job and to the situation the council workers are in.
Malone tells her to wear her heart on her sleeve as she sings: 鈥淲e鈥檝e been broken down to the lowest turn and being on the bottom line sure ain鈥檛 no fun.鈥
Siobhan starts to cry as she talks about the pressures of her job.
鈥淚f I鈥檓 going to sing this song, I have to tap into that part of my mind where all those horrible things I see at work are kept,鈥 she says.
鈥淵ou can save children just before death, I鈥檓 not exaggerating when I say that. We see some horrible things and it鈥檚 very, very upsetting but you don鈥檛 have time to deal with those emotions.
鈥淵ou have to stand in hospital with children with broken limbs and fill in forms and liaise with people. You don鈥檛 have time to have a good old cry.鈥
Malone is filmed reading of the council cuts in the Birmingham Post鈥檚 sister paper, the Birmingham Mail.
He says: 鈥淚t鈥檚 so miserable reading this. I鈥檝e seen articles like this for the last couple of years and not batted an eyelid. But now I know people who work in leisure centres and are at risk of having their job cut, it feels rather different.
鈥淚 didn鈥檛 really understand the human cost of the cuts until I came to Birmingham.
鈥淚t鈥檚 so difficult, how do you bounce back from that and still come to work and be cheerful. It鈥檚 pretty awful.鈥
The choir鈥檚 first rehearsals, in the banqueting suite of the council house, do not go that well and Malone has to tell them off for not practising enough.
But their first performance in front of the three judges, held at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery in front of colleagues, friends and family, is hailed a triumph.
鈥淚t really worked as a moment in Birmingham City Council鈥檚 history,鈥 says Malone.
The next step for the choir is to go forward into a knockout competition, against P&O Ferries, Sainsbury鈥檚, Citi bank and Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service.
The Choir continues on BBC2 on Mondays at 9pm.
