Mark Andrews: What councils mean by 'consultation' and the towering inferno that wasn't

Sandwell Council asked the public for their views on a proposed cycle lane along a hugely busy route from Great Bridge, in Tipton, to Dudley town centre.

The consultation attracted 85 responses, 40 of which were mildly in favour, 44 were vehemently against. Objectors described the plans as 'dangerous' and 'a waste of money'.

Now, granted, it's hardly a landslide, with 52 per cent against, and 48 per cent in favour. A bit like Brexit.

So you probably won't be too surprised to hear that the council decided to go with the 48 per cent, and will plough ahead with the scheme, against the wishes of a small but clear majority.

It reminds me of the old quote from Brian Clough: "If I had an argument with a player, we would sit down for 20 minutes, talk about it, and then decide I was right."

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John Cleese has caused a storm by spending Christmas Day weighing up the respective pros and cons of Adolf Hitler and Donald Trump on Twitter. I wonder how many sherries would need to be consumed for that to seem a good idea.

Anyhow, he concluded that Adolf was better on six counts, and Donald better on just two, namely that he had better hair and 'doesn't practice genocide'.

When I read that, I immediately thought of my old mentor, from my days as a young reporter. He would have been outraged.

I can hear him now: "When you use 'practise' as a verb, you spell it with a blaahdy 's'."

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In fairness, I can see Cleese's reasoning. For a start, Donald Trump seems to be the only person you are actually allowed to joke about these days. Maybe J K Rowling at a push, but you really don't want to go down that road.

Also, today's self-appointed arbiters of what you can and can't joke about are usually the first to invoke the name of Hitler whenever somebody mildly challenges their orthodoxy. So Cleese probably thought he was on safe ground.

His mistake was to attempt to bring humour to the equation. Woke folk aren't big on humour. And if the humour isn't actually very good, you probably won't get many normal people rallying to your call, either.

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'Blackpool Tower engulfed in flames' shrieked the headline on one of the national tabloid's websites on Thursday. A couple of hours later, it sheepishly admitted that, far from being engulfed, the wind had actually caught a bit of orange netting and blown it about.

I do sympathise with the headline writer. In today's cut-throat world of instant online news, the plaudits tend to go to those who get the story out first, not those who wait to check the facts.

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Spare a thought for the lady in Wyoming who forgot to empty her pockets when she went for an MRI scan. Within moments of entering the tunnel, the scanner's magnet snatched the pistol from her dressing gown and shot her in the backside.

The accident form must have made very interesting reading.