As Mr Darling and Mr Brown continue to ruin the economy, people are having to ponder on what they can no longer afford. And many, according to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Animals, have decided the family pet must go. Apparently 30 animals a day are being abandoned at the moment. Almost 60% up on last year.

This is understandable. I mean, if I had a tiger and I lost my job, I’d think seriously about getting rid of it. And it’d be much the same story if I had a whale or a bear of some kind. Certainly, I’ve made it perfectly plain to my donkeys that if Harriet Harman gets her way and I’m replaced on Top Gear by a Somalian lesbian, they’ll be off to the sausage factory.

There is no doubt that some pets are extremely expensive to run. My labradoodle requires a professional shampoo and blow-dry after every rain shower. My golden lab is kept alive with nothing but cash. And the electricity bill for the fox-zapping fence that rings my chickens’ enclosure means that every egg they produce costs roughly £1m.

And then we get to the horses. I have spoken to my wife about turning them into glue but she maintains they are not luxury items at all, and that the only reason she burns the various equine bills is because they are too trivial and small to file away and keep.

Hmmm. They have sweet itch constantly and as a result are always draped in yashmaks that must cost £800,000 each. Plus they need new shoes every two days, and a visit from the psychiatrist every time they see a paper bag in a hedge. And that’s before we get to the fact that their absolute favourite food is the wooden post-and-rail fence that keeps them in the paddock. In a single night, they can eat about 500 yards of it. And fencing is unbelievably expensive to replace.

To stop them doing this, I have painted the new sections with a virulent chilli oil, but it turns out that what they like even more than wooden fencing is wooden fencing smothered in chillies.

I would estimate that the cost of keeping the horses where they belong, preventing Brer Fox from eating the hens, running a lab to hatch the eggs, blow-drying the dogs and retrieving the sheep that ramblers like to chase into the sea at my holiday cottage is about £4 billion a year. I definitely spend more of my earnings on animals than on my cars. Far more.

And so I can quite understand why someone who has been made redundant might turn to his wife and say, “Honey. I’m sorry. But the llamas have to go.”

I noted last week that Harrow school, presumably suffering, like everyone else, from Darling and Brown’s insanity, is having to sell its enormous collection of butterflies. Which have been dead for a hundred years.

However, I was extremely alarmed to see that someone had abandoned a tortoise. I’m not joking. He was handed in to a rescue centre in Bolton because his owners couldn’t afford to run him any more. Now, leaving aside the question of why Bolton needs a tortoise rescue centre, we really must ask how bad things have to be before you say, “Well, I’m sorry, kids, but Tommy the tortoise has to go.”

I realise, of course, that it’s much easier to abandon a tortoise than various other animals. You’re forever reading about people who’ve driven from Scotland to abandon their dog in Exeter and three weeks later it’s homed and is back on their doorstep. Cats can do this as well. Unless you drown them first.

Whereas a tortoise cannot. Take it to the end of the road, and even if it has a homing gene, you and your children will be six feet under before it’s back.

However, I can’t see the point of getting rid of one in the first place. Experts say that tortoises require a diet that contains just the right balance of calcium and phosphorus and that they should be provided with a heated kennel. Then they undermine their authority by saying that tortoises can dig under fences or climb over them and are vicious. I think maybe they’ve got tortoises somehow muddled up with prisoners of war.

The fact is that a tortoise is unbelievably easy to keep. Sure, it may not be very cuddly, it’s completely useless at retrieving sticks and it won’t bark at burglars, but even if it loses a leg, there’s no need to call the vet: simply attach a caster, which can be bought for £2.49 from B&Q.

Apparently the tortoise that was handed in at the Bolton centre had kidney stones because of dehydration. Again. Not a problem. Just give it some water. It doesn’t even need to be Hildon or Evian. What’s more, tortoises are tough little bastards. When I was a kid I had two. Gilbert and Squeak (Sullivan and Bubble died) both escaped one night into a neighbouring field of wheat, where they survived a combine harvester and the burning of the stubble.

Naturally, I have a tortoise today and I have calculated how much he costs to keep every year. In the summer he lazes about in the garden eating dandelions, and in the winter he sleeps so soundly that I use him as a chock for my classic Mercedes. The final bill, then, is nought. Actually, it’s less than nought because without him I’d have to get the Merc’s handbrake repaired. Henry is in fact saving me money.

And best of all, he will live to be 1,000, which means we won’t face the same sort of sobbing we had from the children when the vet, for just £30, said the pet mouse had a tumour and would surely die.

For many reasons, then, the tortoise is the ideal recessionary pet. Your other animals, I’m afraid, will have to be left on the central reservation of the M5. It’s something I’ve known for a while. The sort of socialism being practised now by Darling and Brown ultimately kills people’s dogs.

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