1. If you must eat food on the Tube, share it.
If you’re going to stink the place up, the law should say that you have to pass the chips around the carriage. That will either stop the selfish maw-stuffers or make it more bearable for everyone else.
2. No beanie hats.
Look, I know you think it gives you a “working man” vibe, allows you to indulge your fantasy that you’re a damaged cop working undercover in Seventies New York. But listen Serpico, you work for a media agency in Hoxton, your dad is a judge and the last time you took public transport was a milk cart from the Soho Farmhouse car park to your “rustic” chalet. The only hats allowed in London are deerstalkers and bowler hats. Period (as your beloved Americans might say).
3. No more new coffee shops.
That’s enough now. We don’t need any more. Particularly in local “village” areas that like to close down popular chicken shops in favour of an artisan coffee micro-brewery called Java, Bitch, which charges £8 for a latte and holds you in contempt because amateurish lattes ruin the tasting notes of the beans. Same goes for delis.
4. Rawdogging mandatory on all public transport.
Get off your devices, and talk to each other. This would instantly improve all of our lives by 250 per cent and we all know it. But who’ll do it? Not me, for one. So make it law.
5. Lunch should be two hours.
Nobody lunches any more. It’s all eating out of plastic containers at your desk, the dining equivalent of crying into a pillow. Let’s change this: two hours and you have to leave the office. Bring back long, boozy lunches. Half-pissed schmoozing is the only way anyone makes any money in this city and that is a triple fact.
6. Arm women with flamethrowers.
Believe me, men will stop staring.
7. Anyone who works at a hedge fund also has to do community service.
Look, there’s no resenting of bonus culture here or a denial of the value of wealth creation — but also, give a little back, hedgies. It’ll be good for you. This could be extended to other professions, with the exception of journalism. Those people couldn’t even put a high-vis vest on.
8. Special smokers’ pubs for smokers.
If they’re going to be banned from smoking outside pubs, we have to herd the gaspers somewhere. Why not special pubs — call them paddocks — where they can all smoke and flirt and later have wheezing group copulation. Feeld could sponsor it. Meanwhile, us non-smokers can live forever in antiseptic-soaked bars having conversations about capital gains tax.
9. Cheesecake on every corner.
Everyone loves cheesecake but no one talks about it anywhere near as much as they should.
10. All paydays should be aligned.
Let’s bring a once-monthly carnival to the city. Everyone is welcome, except Laurence Fox.
11. Jokes should be told over tannoys.
Londoners like it when you get a “character” Tube driver, who takes over the loudspeakers to drily comment on delays or puts on a silly voice to do the door warnings. We want more of this, but feel not all drivers should be forced to improv. Instead, why not script them one-liners to read out? This will brighten their day and also help ease tensions among passengers when the public transport rawdogging law comes into play. Post-watershed on weekends, dirty jokes are permitted.
12. Replace the Thames with artificial grass.
The river is historic, sure, but get over it. The thing is just an open sewer filled with Russell Brands. Empty it out, install artificial grass and let the children play. It’s what William Blake would have wanted. Unless I’ve misread him again.
13. Giant magnets.
To prevent knife crime. No need to stop and search, just collect all the weapons from the magnet at the end of the day. Obviously, also give back any wheelchairs to their owners and say sorry.
14 Have a daily Best Londoner award.
Someone who has been spotted on CCTV doing a random act of kindness. Fireworks on the Eye will spell out the name of the winner, who will also receive a free cheesecake.
15. Bring back milkmen.
They’re jolly and can keep wives entertained while their husbands are at work. Sorry, that sounds dated and sexist. Make it milkwomen, to keep husbands entertained while their wives are at work. Hmm, still sounds quite offensive, based upon outmoded notions of inflexible gender roles and a demeaning sexualisation of perceived domestic slavery. Look, I just want more milk, okay?
16. Offices should be more like schools.
We should do team sports together on Fridays. Get to try out different subjects; an hour in IT, another on reception, yet another in accounts. Office plays at Christmas. Uniforms. Discos. Nobody tries to make work fun. Why not? Oh you’re so serious you adults, oh so important. In a few years you’ll be retired, then dead. Real important, sure.
17. Culture wars exchange week.
Like a foreign exchange student program, this scheme will require Londoners to adopt the very opposite to their usual political position for one week. This will instantly end the culture war. Which will then be replaced with the empathy war, where people argue about who understands each other the most.
18. Train dogs in first aid.
There are too many dogs in London and they serve no purpose other than to befoul green spaces and act as cute “beards” for terrible people. Instead, let’s train them as paramedics.
