An increase in anti-social behaviour by readers of the Daily Mail is due to boredom following the defeat of Labour say psychologists.
'You can't blame them,' says Dr Josephine Phillips. 'With Gordon Brown gone, they have nothing to kick against, so they naturally hang around on street corners just looking for trouble. Ordinary people are afraid to walk down the street to the newsagent to buy the Guardian or Daily Mirror. It can be quite scary to be faced with a bunch of elderly middle-Englanders loitering under street lamps.'
Eighteen-year-old Kevin Jones said he and his sister Mavis (16) had watched a gang of Daily Mail readers hanging about in the street outside their house.
'We watched from behind the curtains and they looked really threatening. They were leafing through the Daily Mail and seemed to be getting angrier and angrier because they couldn't find anything to get steamed-up about since the general election.'
Dr Phillips admitted that Daily Mail readers needed something to keep them out of mischief. 'They really need a Labour government to whinge about'.
'There's nothing to do around here,' said Sam Pearce (59) who has been a Daily Mail reader all his life and who has been threatened with an ASBO by his Guardian reading neighbours. 'Now with Brown gone and immigration out of the news I haven't had a chance to get nasty about anything for nearly a week. I used to be able to go down to the pub and say, 'Did you read that about single mothers in the Mail?' And we 'd have a really good night having a go. See, you've got to give us Daily Mail readers something to get apoplectic about or there's bound to be trouble'.
Home Secretary Theresa May said the government was determined to tackle the problem of Daily Mail anti-social behaviour amongst its readers. 'I urge them to be patient,' she said. 'The government will soon provide them with plenty to keep them busy and off the streets.'