Town Hall turnips have lost the plot.

BANKS crash, pensions vanish and half the High Street is going bust.

But at least we’ve managed to drag a dangerous and determined criminal into court,

Yes, 64-year-old Janet Devers has been savagely dealt with for daring to sell her fruit and veg by the bowl in an East London market. Janet, whose family have run their stall in Dalston Market since 1940, must pay £5,000 after Hitlers from Hackney Council caught her flogging unweighed peppers for £1 a bowl instead of pricing them up in kilos. Poor old Janet has been selling her produce by the scoop to help out her regular customers who, like a great many shoppers, get confused with kilos. Where was the harm in it? Contrast this persecution of a valuable member of society with the ridiculous generosity another London council, Ealing, is showing to Afghan refugee mum Toorpakai Saiedi. She’s getting £170,000 a year of our money to live rent-free in a £1.2million mansion with 50in plasma TV and every techie toy going. For granny Janet Devers, the dock and poverty. For smirking Toorpakai Saiedi, handouts and luxury. Something’s gone wrong with our country when that can happen. Our council officials have become laws unto themselves. They are more powerful than the Government. Janet was prosecuted after officials from Hackney Council tramped around the local markets looking for any stalls not showing prices in kilos. After seeing her using her old bowl they sent for the police. Two cops stood guard as Janet’s scales were seized. Hackney can’t pretend it was obeying EU laws. Brussels says repeatedly that it has no interest in prosecutions over pounds and ounces. All across Europe market traders flog fruit and veg in unweighed boxes and nobody cares less. So Hackney Council’s decision to prosecute was because IT wants pounds and ounces scrapped. For the sake of the country’s 40,000 market stallholders, shouldn’t Parliament tell Town Halls they have no right to act like this? The courts are full of hard-working folk who have fallen foul of council spies.

Cabbies are a particular target.

Darlington driver Stuart Turner faces a £500 fine for leaving his taxi while he nipped to the loo. Lancaster cabbie Michael Whalley has been fined for the third time for smoking in his empty motor. On top of the fines comes the ever-increasing surveillance. Town Halls can invade your home, listen to your phone, read your emails, check what sites you visit on the internet and monitor your post. Some council bosses earn more than the Prime Minister. Town Halls hire penpushers even as the rest of us face the axe. This transfer of power from the elected Government to the unelected local Gestapo is the most sinister development of recent years. It’s time bullying Town Halls were cut down to size.