In an outstanding example of joined-up government (or, depending on your view, hypocrisy and stupidity), Aberdeen City Council are calling on the Scottish Government to allow them to pass local laws to criminalise begging on the streets.

This, just months after the Council cut £900,000 of funding from the Cyrenians, a homeless charity, forcing the closure of several shelters for the homeless.

The picture is Bartolomé Esteban Murillo’s “Beggar Boys Eating Grapes and Melon”