Football crazy?

The UK it seems has gone football crazy. Red and white flags are going up all over the place - even on cars. Rather naively I assumed that flags on cars were a message of support to our boys in Germany, however, I was soon put right by this e-mail I received recently:

There is concern over the current driving standards in England, so the Department of Transport have devised a scheme to identify poor and dangerous drivers.

This system will allow all road users to recognise the potentially hazardous and dangerous ones, or those with limited driving skills. From the middle of May 2006 all those drivers who are found to be a potential hazard to all other road users will be issued with a white flag, bearing a red cross.

This flag clearly indicates their inability to drive properly. These flags must be clipped to a door of the car and be visible to all other drivers and pedestrians.

Those drivers who have shown particularly poor driving skills will have to display two flags: One on each side of the car to indicate an even greater lack of skill and limited driving intelligence.

Please circulate this to as many other motorists as you can, in order that drivers and pedestrians will be aware of the meaning of these flags.

Thank you for your co-operation.

Department of Transport.