Licking its young and heading off-site
Bloody typical
Bloody but unbowed, Sir Jeremy Beecham, chairman of the Local Government Association, turned up at last Tuesday's antisocial behaviour conference in London's Smith Square fresh from wrangling with firefighters (which we must assume means discussions over pay, rather than some kind of physical recreation).

"It is with some relief that I move on to the relatively safe waters of antisocial behaviour," he chirped, before explaining his fitness for the job at the LGA's helm: "A white, middle-aged, balding male 鈥� I'm completely typical of local government."

I vont to be alone
Eminent property economist Professor Michael Ball of Reading University has made a number of startling Euro observations in his time but surely none so odd as the comment he made at a Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors meeting last week.

Apparently, he revealed, 49% of Swedish people live alone. The moral of this, according to Ball? "The richer you are, the more you want to be by yourself."

From the horse's mouth
Who said politicians never keep their promises? Speaking at the offsite03 conference last Monday, a visibly impressed housing minister, Lord Rooker, promised to get his boss John Prescott down to the exhibition as it would be "a much better use of his time than many of the other things he is doing at the moment". Sure enough, four days later Prescott paid a visit.

Full marks for effort
As if they didn't have enough to worry about supplying modules for the Communities Plan, off-site manufacturers have set their sights further afield. Trotting round the aforementioned offsite03, Prescott was assailed by a manufacturer of a portable steel-frame system. "If you're looking for any help rebuilding Iraq, these are the mechanisms you could use," said the enthusiastic salesman.

Nuclear pay-off
Congratulations to Fiona Bailey, who answered our plea for stories of council "regime change" with a tale from that renowned political bellwether, Basildon.

In the late 1980s the Labour council renamed a local park and street after medieval poll tax protester Wat Tyler and declared the burgh a "nuclear-free" zone 鈥� cue new signs and promotional literature.

Then the Tories returned to power and the park and street were renamed again 鈥� more new signs and more printing bills for local businesses. The nuclear-free zone was also abolished.

Labour has now regained control but, for the moment, the signs are unchanged and the town presumably still welcomes nukes. We will see. McLachlan's cartoon artwork is on its way to Fiona.

Wait till your dad hears about this

I learn that the theme of this year鈥檚 National Childcare Week 鈥� which starts on 9 June, since you ask 鈥� is 鈥渨orking fathers鈥�. I was pleased to note that one of the luminaries speaking is designer Wayne Hemingway, the father-of-three that housebuilder Wimpey roped in to make semis fab. Whether the event clashed with any PTA meetings or school plays was not known as this column went to press.

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Housing Today