Glasgow City Council proudly appointed its first “transparency tsar” earlier this week.

A wheeze of the new SNP leadership, the independent auditor’s job is to sniff out any suspect deals struck under the previous Labour regime.

But evidence given to stunned members of Holyrood’s local government committee suggests the council’s instinct remains for keeping people in the dark.

In the wake of the Grenfell tower tragedy, councils across the country checked local social housing for combustible cladding.

In Glasgow, there was a clean bill of health and all concerned were quick to trumpet the result.

The council then moved on to checking blocks of private flats. It completed its trawl of building warrants and other written records a few weeks ago. This time, the news was unwelcome.

A number of high-rises had combustible aluminium composite material (ACM) cladding akin to Grenfell.

It was of sufficient concern for the council to pass its findings to the Scottish ministerial working group on fire safety set up in June.

But that was the extent of the council’s communication efforts.

It did not, shamefully, tell the residents of the blocks concerned. It did not, inexplicably, even contact the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service directly.

Instead, as Raymond Barlow, the council’s assistant head of planning and building standards, told MSPs, the council handed over its report to ministers and effectively sat on its hands.

Or, as he put it: “We’re simply saying we’re supplying the information to Scottish ministers and then we wish to see what they wish to do with the information before we take it further.”

Mr Barlow also refused to tell MSPs the extent of the problem, saying he was “wary” about naming the high rises concerned.

The impression was of one public body glad to be relieved of the burden of action by passing the buck to another public body.

In theory, because the ministerial group includes the fire service, commanders should have become aware of the cladding.

But the Scottish Government later revealed the findings from Glasgow had not been detailed enough to inform any decisions, and did not say how many properties were affected.

Under heavy criticism, the council finally admitted it had found 57 private properties with some ACM in their construction, some with it “as a substantial part of their make-up”.

It said no building appeared to be a particular fire risk, and it did not want to sow panic.

But, as committee convener Bob Doris said, the discovery of any combustible cladding was “deeply concerning”, and residents deserved to be told.

One emerging theme of Grenfell is the off-hand way the authorities dealt with residents.

Glasgow City Council may not have a landlord duty to the residents of private flats, but it has a duty to act with basic common sense and not cover up the facts.

You do not need a transparency tsar to see it has signally failed.