The nightmare of new police car regulations

LAST night I got pulled by the law for motoring offences. I just can't remember which ones because it was part of a slightly strange nightmare.

After a night eating strange and exotic new foods and getting reacquainted with the joys of a particularly enjoyable single malt I'd gone to bed and somehow, via the Land of Nod, ended up giving someone a lift in my MGB GT. Normally, I'd know this is impossible because it's a restoration project still several months away from its finished state, but because it was a dream it was completely and utterly believable. The good news is that, even if you're only driving it in a dream, it looks and sounds the business.

Unfortunately, a police officer parked up in marked BMW X5 clocked that it wasn't finished, pulled me over and booked me for offences I can't remember, and because this was a dream he also bypassed the boring business of taking me to court, swiping my driving licence off me there and then. Months of classic car motoring swiped from me.... and all because I'd eaten some scallops for supper. Luckily, that's when I woke up.

Surreal as it sounds, I'm worried it could inadvertently come true, because thanks to new agreements affecting the region's police forces being brought in, making the prospect of being pulled by a policeman in an X5 worryingly possible. Under the National Policing Improvement Agency's new arrangements, BMW's biggest off-roader, unfortunately, is one of a small choice of 4x4s on offer to the nation's 54 forces.

It's all part of plans to chop the choice on offer to all of Britain's police forces - including Merseyside Police and Lancashire Constabulary - by agreeing a set list of motor makers to provide the vehicles. The David Cameron in me ought to be praising the fact it's going to save more than £3m and luckily the choice is still large enough to prevent you being able to pick out the unmarked cars, but from a petrolhead point of view it's a crying shame, as it'll almost certainly mark the end of being pulled over by something memorable.

The Krays, for instance, could count on being pulled over by anything from an MG soft top sports car, through Lotus Cortinas and even going up to their criminal chariot of choice, the Jaguar MK2. The real Gene Hunts of the Seventies and Eighties could have booked crooks in Capris, Sunbeam Lotuses and Rover SD1s.

These days, though, you can forget any thoughts of being pulled over by an Alfa, Chrysler, or Lexus to name but three, because they're not on the list. But BMW's cars - including the X5 - are, so I can't rule out my nightmare of being pulled in my cherished classic turning true.

Alternatively, I could just try going to sleep on an empty stomach.

P.S: I know the police car pictured above is not a BMW X5, before any particular readers point it out...