In a statement today (Thursday), council leader Julia Wayward revealed that, despite sitting to the west of Prime Meridian, St Neots is in fact approximately six minutes ahead of GMT.

“The Meridian line crosses through Cambridgeshire,” said CERN spokesman Guillaume la Trec, whose organisation’s Large Hadron Collider of Doom is rumoured to be beneath the Market Square. “In fact, it crosses the A14 near St Ives, to the east of St Neots, meaning the town ‘as always been somewhat behind ze times.”

However, with faint mumblings about the curvature of the Earth and the magnetic pull of Little Barford power station, la Trec’s team have been able to demonstrate that St Neots is, in fact, roughly six minutes on from GMT, and seven minutes fourteen seconds in front of Cambridge.

“The ramifications are of epic proportions,” said council spokesperson Holly Davidson. “Technology companies relocating to St Neots can make sure they are always one step ahead of the competition, by getting to the office six minutes early.”

Councillor van der Whitevanman added, “Imagine when our cinema is built and can show the latest releases six minutes before everyone else. This will be brilliant for the local economy. The extra traffic will devastate the High Street though.”

Not everyone was pleased with the announcement. “The introduction of Ouse Mean Time means that I’ll have to reset my watch every time I go to work in Bedford,” said Jellicoe Place man Simon Harlem, 28, “and that’s going to get right on my tits.”

The town’s publicans were up in arms as well. “This means we’ll have to shut earlier than pubs elsewhere,” said Lee Fosters, 19, of the Corner House, “and we’ve already got that fucking Wetherspoons to contend with – it’s just not on.”

“My house is cracking up,” said Burnt Close resident Sarah Camistic, “and if it goes on much longer I will be too.”

“It’s blatantly the fault of them scientists,” said Eaton Socon man Max Speed. “There’s probably a black hole underneath Eynesbury, which is ever so slowly, imperceptably shrinking all the houses.

“Of course, cement and bricks don’t like being shrunk, so they’re falling to pieces instead.”

Long-suffering CERN spokesman Guillaume la Trec said in an email to the Citizen that he refused to believe the LHC had anything to do with the houses in Eynesbury sinking, and maybe if we had got French builders to build them they would be better quality. “That’s as maybe,” retorted Camistic, “but we’d still be waiting for them to finish their thirtieth Gauloise of the day, and thirty years on we’d barely have foundations.”

Local geologist Garph Jonas, 27, offered another explanation for the phenomenon. “I reckon there’s some massive stone-age caves under Eynesbury, or possibly a mass grave for plague victims from Huntingdon. We should probably knock all the houses down on a whim to check.”

In other news, the Citizen reported this story without speaking to any councillors. Well done us.

The hole materialised over night last week and there was initially some confusion amongst local councillors that it might be the same one that had been existing for some time, undetected in the Town Council’s budget.

Image ©Reuters

Cllr Julia Wayward commented, “There were several thousand in Blackburn, according to John Lennon, and it didn’t do them any harm. I really think this puts St Neots on the map.”

A team of professionals were dispatched to verify the existence of the hole, and after much deliberation for at least three minutes, it was decided that it had actually been there since 1980 and no one had noticed.

Local trader Barry Chuckle said, “I can’t believe it’s been there all this time. We’ve been losing trade for nearly 30 years and no one noticed.” Another town centre business owner, Niall Bittern, said “This hole is a menace to us all; it’s so big you could easily lose a three piece suite and an occasional table in it.”

Councillors in the town hope the hole will fill itself in at some point and normal trading will resume. Cllr Steven van der Van Driver commented that “until the hole has been properly identified and blame apportioned the Town Council would be looking into it. This will involve leaning over it; I hope nobody pushes me.”

The Citizen considered blaming CERN, and their machine of doom which last year was found to be located underneath the town, but decided that joke had most certainly been done to death.

Story by Adam Douglas

Thousands of users got very upset when the site made using the new layout compulsory, when previously they could switch back to their preferred “old” layout.

The situation took a sinister turn in October when members began blaming the new Facebook, or TNFB, on all of life’s woes. Among the issues for which TNFB has been cited are the credit crunch; the technical error in the Large Hadron Collider which prevented us from knowing the answer to life, the universe and everything; annexing the Sudetendland; shooting Bambi’s mum and various rapes, murders and sex crimes.

Now, Westside residents have pointed the finger firmly at TNFB for the destruction of the historic Bell. Conveniently forgetting that the pub has been shut for some time, Great North Road resident Hayley Berry, 31, said “Where exactly am i supposed to drink now? i suppose it will have to be Brewsters with all them snot-nosed brats running around.”

Berry went on, “Clearly the new Facebook is to blame for the vanishing into a black hole of this once great watering hole.”

At the mention of black holes, the Citizen of course contacted CERN, whose Big Bang machine is reputed to be in a cave underneath St Neots. Spokesman Guillaume la Trec said that the Expert Scientists had looked into the problem and the LHC was certainly not to blame. “It is true a black ‘ole appeared and swallowed up zis public ‘ouse,” said la Trec, “but it was in fact just a large puddle of Guinness which ‘ad been disposed of over ze years in ze Bell.”

One internet commenter said, “First!”. Another said, “I don’t think TNFB knocked the pub down, but it is definitely planning to sell us greasy mechanically-recovered meat from the site, as well as providing a new destination for chavs and boy racers. I think it’s called Fried Chicken of kentucky or something.”

The New Facebook was unavailable for comment.

Last year, there was no lighting ceremony after a set of lights fell on a pedestrian’s head. But a spokesman for the council today said that rather than just leave 2007′s decorations as a failure, they would run twelve months late every year.

Re-employed at the council following a leave of absence, Dean Dexter said, “This is a brilliant plan on our part. By staging the 2007 Big Switch-On next Friday (28th), we can go back twelve months and use the lessons we have learned to make some serious money. I mean, improvements.”

The council is hoping that by altering time in this way, St Neots may be able to buck the economic trends of 2008 and become the most affluent area in the UK. “Obviously we’ll have to do away with a few of the more chavvy elements of the town, but we hope that the new KFC will soon be keeping them all occupied at the bottom of Eaton Socon, and if we’re lucky giving them food poisoning too.”

The lights are being turned on by swimmer Mark Foster, who says that if this radical plan to alter reality does indeed work, he’ll be able to win a few more Olympic medals in the 2008 Olympics. “You never know,” he said, “a few golds might persuade the council to bring back the outdoor pool.”

Councillor Bob Farms, who six years ago refused to spend any of an £80million surplus on fixing the ailing outdoor pool, commented that, “You’ve got as much chance of that happening as you have of getting a cinema. Haha!”

As the scheme, which the council are referring to by the snappy title of “Project Turn Back Time”, seems a bit far-fetched, the Citizen went to the town’s basement levels to speak to Guillaume la Trec, spokesman for CERN, whose Big Bang Machine the LHC is located somewhere under the town. “Ze most likely outcome,” said la Trec, “is zat a few people will be confused about the date. Saying zat it is 2007 is probably not going to cause time to actually change.” He went on to comment that at least if CERN inadvertently causes the end of the known universe, St Neots will be able to enjoy one more illuminated Christmas, as all festive seasons will now run fifty-two weeks behind schedule.

The town had been stuck in the past for over a week following a small power cut. Local man Danny Saunders, 22, said he did not enjoy his Wednesday evening after both Virgin and Sky services failed, leaving him stuck with four channels. “I couldn’t even get Channel Five for some softcore,” moaned Saunders. “I couldn’t believe how shit only having four channels was. There as news on three of them at the same time! I’m used to being able to watch Scrubs or Friends on three channels at the same time!”

The power cut also affected Citizen Towers. “I was elsewhere at the time and didn’t know there had even been a power cut,” said editor Tim C. “But it screwed our router and I had to get BT to send us another awful homehub.”

The power cut was, of course, attributed to CERN and their “Big Bang Machine”, the Large Hadron Collider, which is rumoured to be under St Neots. Spokesman Guillaume la Trec said, “Although I am pleased zat we are back in ze news after disappearing off ze radar, I am really getting fucking fed up of you dickheads sinking everything is our fault. A small power cut is hardly ze end of ze known universe. Bollocks to the lot of you.”

During an incident last week, when part of the Large Hadron Collider overheated by almost 100°c, a copy of the 1997 Intergalactic Drivers Atlas was found whilst digging in the machine’s glove box for a fire extinguisher.

“It certainly was a surprising discovery,” said CERN spokesman Guillaume la Trec, 42. “Apparently zer as been zis atlas around for years, created by some sort of extra-terrestrial race. From what we can gather, ze centre of ze universe is in fact in a field near Swindon, on page 42.”

The news has surprised and angered many residents. Sean Forman, 42, a local pub landlord, said, “How dare these Swiss fuckers try to tell us St Neots ain’t the be all and end all of everything. If it ain’t so fantastic then why do so many people wanna live here? They ain’t building another five thousand ‘ouses for nuffink!”

St Neots residents pride themselves on the fact that they “never meant to stay for more than two years.” Apathy and inertia are well-documented phenomena in the town, and after a decade locals can expect to begin vigourously defending St Neots as the best place on Earth if any outsiders question them.

Eaton Ford man Adam Douglas, 42, agreed. “I moved here for ‘a few months’ back in 1987, and although I have moved away a couple of times, I always felt compelled to return within six months of leaving. St Neots is lovely really – we’ve got these fantastic parks, and the river…”

CERN refused to comment on the possible publishers of the atlas, but promised to look into the inertia of St Neots, if and when it solved the 42 questions currently on its list, such as the one of life, the universe and everything. “After all,” said la Trec, “some do say zat zis is ze ultimate question.”

Since like week bad jokes about the LHC, previously rumoured to be underneath St Neots, have proliferated in both internet and graffiti form.

Spokesman Guillaume le Trec, for CERN, said, “We are very tired of this. Truly, we do not want to collide into your large hard-on.”

Fortunately, life does not immitate cartography and the town survived. However, now a new and much more real threat presents itself in the form of the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC.

A group of Expert Scientists at CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, are this evening preparing to fire up the LHC in order to recreate the Big Bang, and hopefully learn about the origins of the universe.

However, a breakaway group from the 8000-odd scientists at CERN, who are made up of over 500 nationalities from the worlds leading scientific institutes, has claimed that the experiment “will cause loads of tiny black holes. These will grow exponentially and eventually may turn the planet inside-out.”

More worryingly, the LHC is reported to be located 100 metres underground somewhere between Geneva airport and the Jura Mountains, in Switzerland, but this new group have hinted that the machine is in fact twelve feet under St Neots.

Longsands College science teacher Winter Daw said, “If the LHC is indeed located underneath St Neots, we will probably find ourselves disappearing into a black hole very soon. These so-called Expert Scientists seem to think that if a black hole does occur, the town will turn upside down and block it up, and no-one will really miss it very much.

“Worse still, the LHC runs on fuel made of ducklings, bunnies, toddlers, the pig from the movie ‘Babe’, and kittens’ tears – it really is quite attrocious.”

Guillaume le Trec, a spokesman for CERN, said, “Clearly this is all, ow you say it, utter bollocks. First thing, we would never put kittens tears in our fuel. Second, the LHC really is underneath Switzerland. And thirdly, if you do fall into a black ‘ole, it’s really nice in there – all sorts of rainbows and cinemas and things.”

The Citizen plans to report on the outcome of the recreation of the Big Bang at CERN, but if it goes badly we won’t be able to. As one local resident and Daily Mail reader put it: “Nothing must ever change or we’ll all die.”