Show caption For whom the Bell End tolls: some residents of Rowley Regis in the West Midlands would like to change their street name. Photograph: Matthew Cooper/PA Opinion How Hitler could solve our housing crisis David Mitchell Thanks to the unhappy residents of Bell End, I’ve come up with a foolproof way to stop house prices soaring Sun 7 Jan 2018 10.00 GMT Share on Facebook

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The residents of Bell End, like many of us, hope 2018 will bring a fresh start. To be clear, I mean the residents of Bell End, the street in Rowley Regis, not Bell End, the village in Worcestershire. The latter Bell Enders probably hope it’ll be a fresh start too, but not in the same way as the Rowley Regis ones.

The English grammatical convention that names of places seldom take a definite or indefinite article is what prevents me from humorously clarifying that I also don’t mean the residents of a bell end – the microbes presaging a venereal disease, perhaps. But, let’s face facts: there’s no way that’s what anyone would really think the phrase “the residents of Bell End” could possibly mean. That double entendre simply will not hold together. Not even in a desperate last-minute script gagging-up session for a Carry On film would they get away with that.

The new beginning the residents of Bell End, Rowley Regis, are hoping for is the renaming of their street. They’re hoping for Twat Close. Of course they’re not. They want a normal name that isn’t slang for either a section of human genitalia or a person so contemptible as to be likened to one. Some of the residents do anyway – there’s a petition, currently signed by 61 people, so they’re a long way short of qualifying for a Commons debate (the BBC Parliament channel will be sorry to hear).

I’m afraid I can’t tell you what percentage of the people who live there 61 names represents. To do that, I’d have to go there and see how big Bell End is. Once again, if only I could have said “how big the Bell End is”, that would have been amusing. But, to reiterate, it’s suspiciously unusual to use definite articles with street names. You’d spot the trick and hate me.

For most people, the housing ladder is dangling above their heads from an oligarch's money-laundering zeppelin

I wouldn’t say “Let’s go shopping on the Oxford Street”, would I? “These days, there are no newspapers still based in the Fleet Street”? No. Though, oddly, I might say “The traffic is often terrible on the Edgware Road”. I don’t know why and it seems a waste as “Edgware Road” doesn’t mean penis or vagina. Or anus, for that matter. “Taking someone up the Edgware Road” has yet to catch on as an expression, probably because, as I say, the traffic is terrible. You’re much better off trying your luck in Lisson Grove.

Anyway, I’m not going to Bell End to see how many people live there because, from the name of the place, I can only assume they’re all total bell ends.

That’s not what I assume. The name of their street reflects on them neither positively nor negatively and only a bell end would think it does. Even whoever named the street is blameless as the name long predates bell end’s use as an insult, which only really started in the 1990s. The road was named after the Bell End Colliery to which it used to lead. The namer wasn’t to know the British were shortly going to stop mining coal and start calling each other bell ends.

So why does it matter? Why change it? Why reduce the country’s quirky texture and spoil the fun of all those who travel to Bell End purely to take pictures of themselves next to the sign? I mean, what are those guys going to do without it? It really doesn’t sound like they’ve got much else in their lives.

That’s certainly the view of some of the residents of Upton-upon-Severn’s Minge Lane. “There has been no plan to change the name of our road,” explained Stephen Young, a 72-year-old resident. “We have had a problem with people nicking the sign but nobody is that fussed about the name. It’s a bit silly really to start a petition.”

A stinging rebuke coming from a resident of another of Britain’s most rude-sounding streets. But, in the reluctant Bell Enders’ defence, the Minge Lane case is subtly different. Stephen Young does not live on a road simply called “Minge” and he might not be so sanguine if he did. That’s what gives Bell End its unrelenting suggestive power: the fact that there are no other words involved. No “Road”, “Avenue” or “Street”. Bell End’s name is 100% bell end, while Minge Lane is less than 56% minge.

But there are still Bell End fans among its residents. Roland Burrows, a curator at the Christian Heritage Centre, located on Bell End, said: “I think it’s a great name. I’ve never thought of any rude connotations at all.” And Labour councillor and Bell End householder Chris Tranter also likes it: “I was born here and lived here for 40 years and it doesn’t bother me. You get the odd giggle on the phone; it is quite amusing really.”

Illustration by David Foldvari.

Two odd views. It’s unusually innocent not to realise Bell End sounds rude, but it’s perhaps even odder to live there for 40 years and still find it amusing. Chris Tranter must get a lot of value out of his fridge magnets. Surely, few long-term residents, even if they don’t mind the name, would have the sheer force of impish will to continue to find it funny.

Meanwhile, the name’s downsides are more tangible. The petition cites “children being bullied and teased at school” and residents also claim that it has a negative impact on property prices: a Bell End semi would apparently fetch £60,000 less than its equivalent on nearby Uplands Avenue. That’s quite an expensive joke. I don’t blame them for wanting the council to change it.

But it gives me an idea of how councils can use their naming powers to alleviate the current housing crisis – in particular, the ridiculous prices in London meaning that, for most people, the housing ladder is dangling hundreds of feet above their heads from the bottom of an oligarch’s money-laundering zeppelin.