CITIES minister Greg Clark has a great sense of timing, doesn't he?

Here we are in the midst of a prolonged period of austerity, with his home region – the North-East hit – harder than most, and he sees fit to suggest that taxpayers would be happy to pay for statues of their local political leaders.

Middlesbrough's elected mayor Ray Mallon, and the former mayor of Hartlepool, Stuart Drummond – alias H'Angus The Monkey – would be the kind of contenders to be cast in bronze under the minister's fanciful idea.

There is no disrespect intended to those individuals, who have both worked hard for their communities during challenging times, but we suggest that Middlesbrough-born Mr Clark is somewhat out of touch with his roots.

We live in very different times from the Victorian age, when the great industrialists such as Henry Bolckow and Joseph Pease forged their great reputations as visionary industrialists.

But imagine the reaction in these days of public sector cuts and democratic disengagement if a council were to put forward a proposal to spend money on a statue of a former mayor.

It would be lovely to think that we might reach a point, somewhere in the rose-tinted future, when our political leaders were the subject of such respect and affection that their images could be cast in metal by public subscription.

Sadly, there is as much chance of that happening as there is of a pig flying past Mr Mallon's Town Hall window.