Heard the one about the bunch of academics who say Northerners should give up on their towns and cities and migrate south?

It might sound like a joke but, as yesterday's papers revealed, the suggestion is serious.

Think tank Policy Exchange, a favourite of David Cameron, came out with this outrageous notion.

Not surprisingly, having likely-as-not choked on his cornflakes, the Conservative leader put as much distance between himself and the report as was humanly possible.

As did just about everybody else.

Apparently regeneration will never work and places like Oldham, Sunderland, Bolton, Bradford and Liverpool are dying. The best thing residents can do, they say, is up sticks and move to Oxford, Cambridge or London where millions more homes should be built.

Halifax was not mentioned but by association one imagines it too would be shut down if these boffins had their way.

There was, as you can imagine, outrage, not least from our European Capital of Culture, Liverpool.

Talk about exacerbating the north-south divide. This maverick piece of mischief-making drives a bulldozer through it.

Northerners and particularly Yorkshire folk are known for straight talking.

So to the visionaries who dreamed this up, some advice – keep your daft ideas to yourselves.