EXCLUSIVE: Mayor Anderson has become the hero of Liverpool by hiring the Pied Piper to rid the city of an invasion of Mutant Super Rats.
The Piper, tin whistle in hand, has led an army of pitbull-sized rodents into the mouth of the Birkenhead Tunnel where they have been gobbled up by a giant French spider, slumbering in the disused dock exit.
Meanwhile, confused graffiti artist Banksy has got wind of the giant rat tale and is on his way to Liverpool with a fresh supply of Dulux.
The above “breaking-news story” is fetched from about as far away as the panic headlines in media all over the UK and beyond this week.
They inform the world that massive super rats are pounding the streets of Liverpool.
The shock news all stems from one source: the Liverpool Echo, which broke the slumbers of Sunday by screaming: “MUTANT SUPER RATS INVADING LIVERPOOL”; sub heading “Giant rodents are immune to poison”.
With the story was a man holding up a huge rodent, captioned underneath: “one of the giant rats”.
But wait: Could this be the same super rat that appeared last year in popular London newspaper the Ham&High, with the headline “Giant rat discovered under Highgate dishwasher as bins overflow onto streets”?
It could indeed, taken by householder Adrian Whitaker who caught and killed the rat in his West London home.
Today Mr Whitaker was once again in the Ham&High, this time wondering why a picture of him and his Highgate rat have suddenly been exported to Liverpool. It doesn't end there: as well as appearing in the ECHO, he and the rat have also made the front page of the Daily Mirror, the Daily Mail and at least one international news wire.
Liverpool city council’s media department even received a call from a Paris-based news organisation asking about the city’s mutant rat invasion.
Ham&High, owned by Archant Group, a rival to Echo-owners Trinity Mirror, have also contacted Old Hall Street to ask for an explanation.
Demading an apology:
Adrian Whitaker
Ham&High writer Tim Lamden said: “Adrian has received messages from friends asking him why him and his rat have moved 200 miles north to Liverpool.”
To add to the muddle, it seems Liverpool's own civic rat catchers have never even glimpsed a big one.
A statement produced by Liverpool City Council says: "Claims that Liverpool is being overrun by mutant super rats are not based in fact. The number of call-outs to deal with rats, although showing a slight increase in the last year, has remained relatively consistent over the last few years.
“We have also not noticed that the size of rats has grown in recent years There is also no evidence that the rats are immune to the bait we use."
So where has it all come from?
Similar mutant super rat stories have been popping up in regional papers across the country. It seems it is down to a PR puff promoting a commercial rat catching business, Whelan Pest Control, quoted extensively in the rat tale.
Mr Whitaker told the Ham&High: “It’s a bit of a shock, I wasn’t expecting it.
“It just makes me realise how much more of this probably goes on in tabloids. It’s not really journalism if you’re making stuff up and sensationalising.”
A rat's tale
Tim Lamden told Liverpool Confidential: “Many people will now be thinking Liverpool is being overrun with mutant giant rats.”
The Echo and its big brother, The Mirror, which splashed on the story, claimed the rat was caught in Liverpool by Sean Whelan.
Both have since taken the story down from their sites. Like Liverpool's only truly documented giant rat, on the White House pub, it has been airbrushed out of history.
UPDATE (April 16): The Mirror has agreed to pay an undisclosed sum to Adrian Whitaker to make up for the error in using his picture.
Yesterday, a Trinity Mirror spokesman said: “We were deceived about the picture of the giant rat. We were led to believe that it had been taken recently on an industrial estate in Liverpool."
Pictures (mostly) Ham&High
