Eric Pickles Suddenly Likes Democracy.

Eric Pickles, writing in the "Guardian," has come out in support of democracy. "I've never had much to do with it before," he told our political editor, "but I must say it does have certain advantages. Take planning for instance. In the past my pals, the property developers, not only had to battle against local protestors they also had to conform to really complicated rules from central government. I plan to make sure that they only have to bribe local councillors by taking central government out of the equation. Now you might think this will remove a valuable source of income away from MP's and I suppose it does - but my party has trousered a huge amount of money for this and we can squeeze a bit more before its all over. Bugger local MP's, especially if they're Labour, I'm making a bleeding fortune." Labour MP's were rather gloomy at the news. "Most of the property developers are looking to blight greenfield sites rather than revamp inner city brownfield ones so me and my mates will probably miss out," one told our Westminster reporter. "What Pickles doesn't understand is that supporting property development was a nice little earner for all of us and now he's gone and spoiled it all by making a direct deal and funneling all that lovely cash to the Tory party. Bastard." The LibDems have a different take on the matter. "This is a great day for democracy," an unnamed spokesman for the party told us. "Now we'll have a bunch of local nimby's locked in an unequal struggle with savvy developers armed to the teeth with the best justice money can buy."