CONGRATULATIONS to Rebecca Scrase, press officer for Mid Suffolk council, who has produced an innovative and handy media pack for Thursday's district elections.

CONGRATULATIONS to Rebecca Scrase, press officer for Mid Suffolk council, who has produced an innovative and handy media pack for Thursday's district elections.

It includes a detailed breakdown of the current political composition of the authority, the names of the leaders of all the party groups, phone numbers of the council's elections officers, a map showing the ward boundaries, and reproduces the nomination details of all candidates.

A media centre has been set up at the council's offices at Needham Market, where a comprehensive results services will be provided for journalists as results come in from the various counting centres throughout Mid Suffolk.

The council estimates all results from the widely scattered district will be known by 11.30pm on May 1. What a pity Mid Suffolk only has elections every four years.

And in Chelmsford, the borough council will put its results online as soon as they are declared, with the first expected around 10pm. Check out www.chelmsfordbc.gov.uk/results

COMMISERATIONS to Maria Khanbhai, the charming wife of East of England Conservative Euro MP Bashir Khanbhai, who was the victim of a steamer attack in Seville during the Easter break. Mrs Khanbhai had her handbag stolen, containing her passport, money and other personal possessions, as she got out of her car. An emergency passport had to be obtained to permit her to travel back to the UK, but I'm pleased to report that she was not physically injured in the incident.

CONDOLENSCES to all passengers trapped in the hell of trying get to London yesterday morning. I boarded Anglia's 7.52 service at Ipswich, which crawled into Colchester at 9.31, eventually arriving at Liverpool Street around 10.30, nearly an hour and a half late thanks to signalling problems at Marks Tey. If there was an upside to the journey it was that once we cleared Witham, Anglia offered free tea and coffee to all.

WHAT an excellent crop of Easter eggs this year, and they seem to have been bigger than usual. But, of course, all that wasteful packaging was on the large size as well.

Ipswich has 54,000 households and it's not unreasonable to assume that at two eggs per home, about 108,000 empty Easter egg cartons are now languishing on some Suffolk landfill site because the borough has no household cardboard collection service.

A spokesman for the council said no contractor could be found to recycle cardboard, which is why the council does not collect it. As the borough council collects household rubbish and the county is responsible for disposing of it, perhaps Ipswich's five professional councillors – four Labour and one Lib Dem who serve on the county and district authorities – should try to sort out the problem.