From the Mean Streets of Crapchester

Another late night update from riot-stricken Britain. Don't worry, I'm calmer now. Not to mention less drunk. Nevertheless, i remain unrepentant over yesterday's rant. The fact is that the whole thing left me feeling exhilarated. Although the disturbances seem to have died down, (in London, at least), I've been left feeling young and hopeful again. Once more, I'm not condoning the violence and lawlessness, but the fact that such anger and frustration exists amongst at least some of the population makes me hopeful for the future - if only someone can find a way to tap into this and harness the anger at the current political, economic and social situation into a legitimate political campaign, then perhaps we might finally get some real change in this country. Moreover, it was good to see the negative reaction Clegg and Boris Johnson got when they took to the streets in a damage limitation exercise. They showed just how out of touch they really are, with no understanding of what's happening in the inner cities, far from their cosy public schools.

Anyway, I've been out on the streets of Crapchester myself all day, working in some of our roughest housing estates. I'd like to say that the atmosphere was electric. Except that it wasn't. The only young people in evidence were ten year olds out on their bikes. That said, I heard that someone kicked an empty beer can at a police car in the town centre and that some kids let off a couple of fireworks in the War Memorial Park. To be fair, Two Ton Toby from the chippie tried to instigate a bit of urban unrest this morning. It all started as a protest about the council's failure to empty his recycling bin. At least, that's what he claimed. He started by shouting at the refuse collectors, before it all escalated when some local kids joined in. Before he knew it, Toby found himself helping them turn a car over and set fire to it - it was only when it was well ablaze that he realised it was his car. Even worse, it was still in his driveway, with the fire threatening to spread to the garage. Although he dialled 999 on his mobile and called the fire brigade, Toby admitted that he was still caught up in the moment when they arrived, and found himself throwing bricks at them.

If nothing else, we thought, Toby's one man riot might at least give the local regional news programme something to report on. We thought they'd be feeling a bit left out, as all the riots had taken place outside of our BBC region, meaning they'd be forced to report on the latest cattle stampede whilst there was a revolution breaking out just up the road. We needn't have worried. I caught the lunchtime broadcast - despite there having been no riots in our area, the whole bulletin was devoted to scaremongering about how there might be riots here tonight. Apparently people were in the grip of fear and shopkeepers were busy barricading their premises. Not round here, though. That said, you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference if a riot did break out around here. Although I doubt there'd be widespread looting - most of the shops have already been stripped of their stock by shoplifting kids by this point in the school holidays.