I see this differently.
Imagine, if you will, that you are a thrusting entrepreneur, you have an idea that could earn you millions in the private sector. Your entrepreneurship is tempered with a philanthropic bent (still legal, I think) so, instead of earning squillions and shoving down your throat, hoovering it up your hooter and exchanging bodily fluids with ladies of negotiable affections in implausibly lavish residences around the world you come over all public sector and selfless.
What are you to do? You need to find someone in the public sector with vision, passion, another vision and a sense of vibrancy. Enter SBC, I imagine there was sunbeams shearing through the clouds, heavenly portents and a 'sign' or two at this divine meeting of an idea and a body with the means to deliver that idea to the masses.
You then embark on delivering the now shared vision, you of course claim nothing but expenses and because you are on a morally charged mission you do not trouble yourself with such ephemera as 'bills', however you have not factored in SBC's rapacious appetite for cash. This appetite is spurred on by SBC's desire to freeze council tax for the 97th consecutive year and it's determination to deliver this gift to it's huddled masses.
Anyway, 6 months later you are skint and universally reviled throughout the borough through no fault of your own, your only mistake being to underestimate SBC's consuming desire to deliver maximum services at minimum cost.
Swindon, the town where business comes to fold.
Alternatively I am naive and it is simply a case of chancers who can hardly believe their luck at finding there is in fact a market for magic beans.