In a mind-numbing report, World Class Places, published last May under the signatures and beaming faces of Hazel Blears (since resigned) and Andy Burnham (moved on), we were told the government "is committed to improving the places where we live, whether these be villages or large cities".
"We have world class scientists and they need world class places to do their work you would not keep a Da Vinci in a garden shed".
But it's a world-class place to mess about on boats – and it's welcoming to everyone.
We have a responsibility to future generations to get this right as we provide a world-class solution for a world-class place".
Everywhere in Britain was to become a "world-class place" – somewhere, presumably, along the lines of Birmingham's revamped Bull Ring or Las Vegas, Shanghai's Pudong district, or Sodom and Gomorrah.
"Imperial is a world-class place for research, but London is not an environment that focuses on manufacturing," he says.
In the mid-1950s, theiresearchch and courses turned the university into a world-class place in the field.
Mr Hodge said: "Surrey has been the epicentre of world cycling over the past few days, cementing the county's reputation as a world-class place to ride.
The strong showing by UK restaurants suggests the land of bangers and baked beans now boasts more world-class places to eat than the US and traditional gastronomic hotspots such as France and Italy.
As for Cabe, set up by Blair's department of culture, media and sport, this tax-eating body barks fashionably about "sustainability" and good design, while robustly promoting the building of supermarkets in the very last of Britain's independent country towns, towns happy to be themselves rather than clown-like, retail-crazy "world-class places".
"The commitment to the World Class programme places significant pressures on a player and I fully respect the decision Imogen has made," he said.
