I always think I can't be any more dumbstruck by the morons looking after our country when along comes another example of sheer bl**dy stupidity and over reaction.

Today the news papers reported on a 66 year old woman who has been fined £1000, placed under curfew and is to be tagged for 2 months.

Her son mark was fined as well and ordered to do 120 hours of community service.

And what was the crime that this Mother and Son demonic duo must have been guilty of for such a sentence?

Surely they must have held a group of hostages for a multimillion pound ransom at least.

Perhaps they carried out a daring raid on the loacl post office.

No THEY SOLD A GOLD FISH TO A TEENAGER! and for this they now both have criminal records.

I kid you not!

It seems there's a law in this country that says you can't sell a pet to anyone under the age of 16. Now I'd never heard of that one.

But a local trading standards office decided to carry out a devil's advocate sting (otherwise known as a ridiculous waste of tax payers money) and sent a 14 year old boy into a local pet shop to buy a goldfish!

After that the wheels of justice were set in motion and the rules had to be seen to be done.

Now I am not advocating that we all ignore laws that protect animals but if we can happily allow the morons of previous postings to swan around, terrorising the general public with sets of canine muscle and teeth on short leads why the HELL are council brick-heads and moronic magistrates being allowed to even consider this level of punishment for the sale of a goldfish?

I suspect that it's because the woman concerned was a damnably easy target.

So if your a normally law abiding citizen and you make an honest mistake - tough luck squire because the black cap comes out and it's hanging offence buddy.

But if you're a recidivist then it's society's fault and here, have another hand out and accept our apologies for society having made you a lazy, good for nothing skiving scumbag!

You really couldn't make this up and if it had been in tomorrow's paper as an April 1st joke we'd all laugh heartily and go on our way amused and chortling. But this is fact not fiction. And trust me, if we vote Gordon-the-moron Brown and his marry band of europhiles back into power in a couple of months it ISN'T going to get any better any time soon !