‘A car dealership in the United States is offering a free handgun with every vehicle sold,’ the BBC reports. ‘Max Motors in Butler, Missouri, says sales have quadrupled since the start of the offer.’ Like McDonald’s, Dallas, serial killers and rampant obesity it’s only a matter of time before this fine notion from the Land of the Free reaches the UK. Darton Honda supplying a 12 bore with every Jazz sold. Slaithwaite Skoda dishing out AK-47s with select models of the taxi-drivers’ favourite motor car – the Octavia. It won’t be long.

And unlike the idea of boycotting BP and ESSO stations, haulage blockades and running the family hatchback on Crisp and Dry this is, perhaps, finally a measured response to the increasing cost of fuel. It is the automotive version of the secret agent’s cyanide pill.

The gun will be kept in a glass compartment, the slogan ‘Break only when you’ve reached the end of your tether’ emblazoned across in 50 point red sans serif. With oil now at $135 a barrel before long we’ll all be taking out the complimentary Nissan Walther PPK. Salesmen watching with resigned horror as the needle falls into the red line on their diesel Mondeos, an appointment at 3PM in Boston that will never be kept. Calmly they pull over onto the hard shoulder of their respective M18, drag off their nylon/silk mix tie, unfasten the top button of the shirt from George at ASDA, a text message home then cradling the courtesy Ford revolver blow their brains out. Bang. Pulp Fiction. Lorry drivers at the Woolley Edge service station examine the profit and loss figures, the margins, the diminishing standard of living. A final Yorkie, then a suicide note to Gordon Brown on lavender paper in red ink before they nuzzle the point of the free Iveco supplied 9mm into their mouths and pull the trigger.

I drove past Tescos yesterday. £1.11 per litre for unleaded. Bugger me. Where did I put that Audi-branded Glock 19?