Clamping down: Super-rich boy racers deserve the wrath of the state

The rich are different from you and me. For one thing, they have different problems. It is not the shadow of the food bank, the threat of disappearing tax credits or Jeremy Hunt’s decision to quietly kill off his promise to cap care bills for the over-65s that keeps the residents of the capital’s wealthiest areas, such as Knightsbridge and Chelsea, awake at night.

If you live a short walk from Harrods, it is more likely to be the sound of Lamborghini Aventadors, Chevrolet Camaros, crystal-studded Ferraris and souped-up Bentleys racing around the neighbourhood’s gracious squares that drives you mad.

Every summer for some years now, the area has become temporary home to some of the most glittering automotive real estate on the planet, as rich kids from the Gulf ship in their sports cars and devote the evenings to showing them off, mostly to each other.

Now the locals have had enough and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is planning to use powers vested in it by the new Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act to clamp a Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO) on the area.

If enacted, this will make it illegal for motorists to do what these boy racers most enjoy doing, including sounding their horns, revving their engines and performing stunts.

To date, the firepower of the PSPO has largely been turned on the bleak attempts of the very poor to turn a penny: busking, selling lucky charms and dog walking are among the activities that have been proscribed. So it is high time that the most glittering corners of London felt the latest baleful gusts from Theresa May’s nanny state. How the law will be enforced, however, is anybody’s guess. Perhaps some of the residents would like to volunteer as members of the Special Constabulary.