I MAY have inadvertently given the impression in the past that I think the nation's underclass is thick. This is clearly not the case.

It takes a certain rat-like cunning to survive on the mean streets of Mr Blah's NuBritain.

There are forms to fill out, benefits to claim and gullible (or lazy) civil servants to take advantage of.

There are GPs to con (or intimidate), JobCentre staff to dodge, and a whole black economy to exploit, cash in hand, no questions asked.

And then there's the daily grind of shoplifting, debt-dodging and drug-taking. So it's no easy ride.

Which probably explains the latest brainwave to be doing the rounds among the belly-pierced, muffin-topped, leggings-wearing baby machines who aim to pop out a nipper a year in pursuit of a council flat and £20,000 a year.

The word on the street is that pregnant teenagers are taking up smoking in the hope of having smaller babies so that childbirth is less painful. No, really.

I tell you what - you've got to admire their lateral thinking.

NOW how many times do you hear this? "He was a quiet man who liked to keep himself to himself".

I'll tell you - every single time there's a horrific murder, the latest of which was the tragic slaughter of five girls in an Amish school in Pennsylvania. The killer is always, always described by a family friend or a neighbour as "a quiet man who liked to keep himself to himself".

Can I make a suggestion? Why don't we just lock up anyone who could possibly be described as "a quiet man who liked to keep himself to himself"?

AM I wrong to enjoy it when treehuggers mess up?

They're already responsible for the deforestation of huge swathes of the Amazon jungle (the trees are ripped up to plant soya, which then goes into Linda McCartney sausages); they're already responsible for wiping out most of Norway's eagle population (a wind farm off the coast has minced them all); now they've managed to bump off an Asian immigrant by hounding him to death.

The incomer in question was a rare Mongolian starling, never before seen in this country, that had the misfortune to get blown off course and end up in Norfolk.

Once there it got on quite happily with the six-fingered natives until someone blabbed and told the newspapers. Suddenly hundreds of bird-watchers turned up with binoculars, telephoto lenses and flasks of sweet tea and started chasing it from hedge to hedge.

Exhausted by this all this kerfuffle, the Mongolian starling promptly popped its clogs, so denying train loads of twitchers the spot of their lives. Or a cat got it; one or the other. So well done, all you animal lovers.

With form like that you may as well join the local shoot.