AN AUTHENTICALLY working class area of London will be allowed to continue existing as a tourist attraction.

A one-mile-square section of Barking is to be preserved as the London Museum of Common Life, where visitors in armoured buses can see the city as it was in its lawless, pre-gentrification state.

Mayor Boris Johnson said: “The developers won’t be allowed in, and the locals won’t be allowed out. They must continue with their gritty existences, acting out their vivid family dramas and cash-in-hand business interactions for the benefit of paying visitors.

“When I visited, the armed guide took us to a ‘one pound shop’ to buy mysterious foreign cleaning products, and then we went to a cafe and ate things cooked by a fat lady in an overall.

“The avocados in the local market are so cheap it’s astonishing. I wouldn’t eat one though, they’re probably all grey inside.”

North Londoner Helen Archer visited the museum in search of a community experience: “They have shops that sell nothing but office furniture, and pubs that don’t do food.

“There are stalls that repair Apple laptops but without being officially endorsed by the corporation. And tattooed shirtless men with lean bodies like greyhounds.”