PRESS RELEASE FROM THE TOWN HALL

MAYORAL VISION WORK SCOOPS NATIONAL AWARD

Westphalia-on-Sea's Mayoral Vision project has scooped a national award at the prestigious 2008 Pie-in-the-Sky Awards.

The 66-page document and accompanying virtual, walk-through film, detailing ambitious plans for regenerating the bay, fought off stiff competition from projects across the country (including a sustainable eco-plan to build a new terminal at Stansted Airport entirely from matches and old washing up bottles) to win the 'I Can't Believe It's Not Bullshit' category.

When evaluating the entries under the 'I Can't Believe It's Not Bullshit' category the judges said: "The key criteria in this category are who are you fooling and have you slipped a couple of extra zeros on to the bottom of your invoice? It should also be evident that the material has been developed by people who don't know the area and seem to have a very loose grip on reality."

The Mayor of Westphalia-on-Sea, Dr Pangloss, said: "This is a fantastic achievement, relecting the hard work and commitment that went into the vision, but not by me, obviously. At the outset I tried to imply that it was my vision, but it quickly became obvious that we had paid Complete Commercial Upgrading & New Town Solutions a small fortune to produce the vision. As you know, this council firmly believes in paying consultants to do our thinking for us. Of course, the community is still involved, because they're the ones who foot the bill. Therefore it is extremely satisfying to have won this particular category, judged by landscape professionals and the criminally insane."

"A challenging aspect of the project was to completely fool a wide audience including education, business and community stakeholders, the press, investors, council officers and the community. It was an incredible bit of 'smoke and mirrors' to cobble together a load of archive footage and modern computer graphics in order to pretend that something positive is actually going to happen in Westphalia-on-Sea."

"The projects laid out in the document and film have become an inspiration for many people in Westphalia-on-Sea as well as potential investors. You only have to visit the few remaining shopkeepers in Crossways in Eastphalia to find out exactly how inspired they are - it's truly magical."

The Councillor For Unbelievable Cock-Ups added: "This is fantastic news and a real coup for the bay in terms of national publicity and raising the profile of our efforts for regeneration. The last time we were on the BBC Breakfast programme it was a piece about drunks having to clear up after urinating and defecating in people's doorways around the harbour, so this is definitely a step in the right direction, even though it has no basis in reality."

"I would like to take this opportunity to thank LDA design of Exhole for relieving us of so much cash and pulling the wool over the eyes of our residents, businesses, and potential investors - I can hardly believe it."

Derek Poundsign, partner at Complete Commercial Upgrading & New Town Solutions said: "The Mayoral Vision is a very ambitious regeneration initiative for Westphalia-on-Sea and its success will ultimately rely on it's ability to connect with the Westphalia-on-Sea public and with investors and developers in the area and from further afield." He then added: "That's consultant-speak for 'nothing will actually happen because it's just a lot of tosh we dreamed up', but this award will give us some very welcome publicity and allow us to increase our fees by about ten per cent, so we really owe the people of Westphalia-on-Sea on this one."

ENDS

A photo opportunity is available - if you are one of the people that actually believes any of this crap why not have your photo taken with a grinning Dr Pangloss? Please contact the Communications Officer at the Westphalia-on-Sea Town Hall.