This week brought a fresh hammer blow to the Chipping Norton Set. These power brokers are a bit like the Bilderburg group, except with more antiques shops and tea rooms.

Apparently, they control Britain from the edge of the Cotswolds by bugging people’s phone messages, running the Government and, errr, presenting Top Gear.

But now their plutocratic grip on the nation has been loosened by those famous radicals, the Michelin Guide judges.

These gastronomic secret agents have stripped not one, not two, but three of the Set’s favourite haunts from the 2012 edition. The Kingham Plough, The Carpenters Arms in Fulbrook, and The Masons Arms in Swerford have all lost their Bib Gourmands.

Maybe the judges thought someone at the next table was listening to their conversations?

He’s the man of the people who says it how it is.

So the biggest cheer of Monday’s city council meeting was reserved for Independent Working Class Association councillor Stuart Craft.

In a rather circular discussion about which organisations – businesses or charities – caused the most littering in the city centre by handing out leaflets, he placed the blame squarely on the dealers of the opium of the people.

“Of all the groups, it’s the bloody religious groups that are the biggest pain,” he announced.

“You cannot walk down Cornmarket Street without being harangued by the muslims, or the Christians, or some other nutter. This is Grumpy Old Man time here, but if it’s not the religious, it’s the charity chuggers.”

Who says police officers spend too much time doing paperwork and not enough time on the beat?

Tweeting top cop Ch Insp Colin Paine admitted this week that years behind a desk had left him rather unsure about how to deal with actual crimes.

He tweeted: “Just dealt with a shoplifting in Witney.

“Glad I'm crewed with a PC who can remind me what to do. It's been too long since I took statements.”

As reported last week, Oxford University has published some of its brain-teasing interview questions designed to test potential undergraduates applying for a place.

So The Insider asked one of the university’s top young comedians, Oxford Revue president Adam Lebovits, to give his answers to some of the tutors’ posers, given there are apparently no right or wrong answers. Enjoy.

Q: Why do lions have manes?

A: So they can conveniently pass off as lions at fancy-dress parties.

Q: In a world where English is a global language, why learn French?

A: To communicate with people from other planets.

Q: Ladybirds are red. So are strawberries. Why?

A: So you don’t confuse either with a blueberry.

Q: How hot does the air have to be in a hot-air balloon if I wanted to use it to lift an elephant?

A: As hot as the weather would have to be to make you want to do that in the first place.

Q: Would it matter if tigers became extinct?

A: It would help the lions stand out even more at the fancy dress parties.