FAITHFUL readers will recall that I started training for the Manchester 10K on May 16.

I’m making progress, but it is hard work – age is taking its toll and, with a hectic social life, it is hard to say no to the odd pint of Black Sheep.

Sadly therefore I’m still carrying far too much weight around with me.

I’m up to 4.16 miles in 52 minutes. I am confident of this as I keep borrowing Mrs B’s satnav thing, which is fabbo – almost as good as Sky Plus, but not quite – so I won’t be bothering the Ethiopians on May 16!

I keep myself going on my runs listening to Radio Four, mainly the Today programme. I chunter and grumble as I plod my way around the highways and byways of Rossendale usually despairing of the woolly, dare-not-say-what-they-really-mean politicians, who take on John Humphreys. (By the way I think he’s gone a little soft of late, or maybe he’s given up trying to take them on).

Last Monday, early in the morning, I let out a whoop of delight when I heard West Yorkshire Police chief constable Sir Norman Bettison declare he felt he was paid too much (actually £213,000 a year in salary and ‘other emoluments’ plus a truly fantastic public sector pension).

Are people beginning to wake up and be ashamed of what has been happening in the public sector during the past 15 years?

It has been the All Time Gravy train. The salaries of the chief executives of NHS trusts have increased by 150 per cent during the past 10 years. Anyone who criticises this state of affairs is fobbed off with the argument that if the pay for those at the top were lower, the calibre of our public sector leaders would diminish and the services would suffer.

I reckon this is nonsense, and now it has been exposed as such by one of its beneficiaries, with refreshing candour by Sir Norman.

The majority of these highly paid officers have not been tempted from the private sector but are career civil servants and would have done the job for far less in any event.

To his credit, Sir Norman, whose force has a budget of £427million and 10,000 staff, decided to forgo his own bonus last year. He is now proposing a freeze on pay and pension entitlements among the top quarter of public sector earners for at least the next three years.

This is not an anti-public sector rant; how can it be when it is propounded by one if its own? It is an example of sense and proportion all too rarely exhibited by senior public servants.