ON THOSE rare occasions when we are struggling to find a cracking front page story and have a number of options that don’t quite fill me with excitement, we’ve adopted the latest ‘buzz phrase’.

We’ll have to go for the least bad option.

We are happy to attribute the phrase to the council leader Cllr Stephen MacLoughlin who said the patch of land under the Wessex Way was the only place where the town could create two-thirds of the statutory pitches for travellers outlined by the government.

Given that they have at least 11 alternative sites, you wonder just how far off the mark the majority of these must be if they’ve even rejected that “least bad option”.

But however relieved the residents and businesses close to the Cambridge Road site will be, the problem still remains.

We have to provide a specific number of places for travellers or the government will simply do it for us (and given their current decision-making prowess, that could be in the Lower Gardens).

The problem is that nobody wants an encampment near them. Justifiably given past encounters, the people of Bournemouth have a bit of an issue with travellers, but those kind of encounters could continue if this decision is not taken.

It’s time to bite the bullet, whittle the list down to three and get a working party to make a decision... and stick with it.