Comics need a new target; LIVERPOOL DAILY POST An independent newspaper Established in 1855 .

IT'S so much part of the Liverpool image that it even raises a few wry laughs in the city itself. Park your car in Liverpool and you can almost set your watch by the time it takes the local scallies to steal the hubcaps.

It would be nice to think that comedians up and down the country will decide to give up the chance of a cheap laugh at Liverpool's expense in the wake of new car crime figure, but quite frankly we doubt it.

Yet, it is Chislehurst, a pleasant outer suburb of London whose greatest resident was probably ex-Emperor Napoleon III of France, which holds the unwanted title of being Britain's car crime capital.

Work down the list and unlikely names like Wingate in Durham and Redbridge in outer London all come up before you hit the first of the big cities notorious for car crime, Manchester.

But there is still no sign of Liverpool. Cities like Cardiff, Sheffield and Leeds all crop up, but you have to work your way down to number 44 before a district of Liverpool crops up - and even that is Halewood, in Knowsley.

It's a record everyone in and around Liverpool can be proud of, from the police and other authorities keeping an eye on our cars to the car owners who presumably have learned their lessons about preventing crime before it even takes place.

In these straitened times, we would hardly want to put comedians out of work by cutting off their material. But maybe some reworking is needed: for Scouse scallies read Chislehurst chavs throughout, perhaps? And if the good citizens of Chislehurst think that's unfair on them, well, we in Liverpool know just how they feel.