London is a dump. It is crowded, over-priced and overrated. The Underground service is erratic, the streets are littered with burger cartons and muggers lurk behind every lamp post. Do not even get me started on pearly kings. Londoners should admit defeat. They should abandon their crumbling, failing city and move somewhere halfway decent. Like Huddersfield.

Having delivered this diatribe, I expect to avoid the punishments that would result had I insulted a smaller, less confident conurbation. London mayor Boris Johnson will not demand that I apologise for the outrage that my ill-informed comments have occasioned. The London Evening Standard will not anathematise me as a “crackpot columnist from up north”. Nor will I receive 150 flaming e-mails from cockneys accusing me of being “gay”, “ginger” or a “paedophile”.