MISTAKES, when you think about it, are probably crucial to the UK economy. Exploiting failures and extracting compensation from those who get things wrong is a major industry and there would be much gnashing of teeth in some circles if we ever achieved a perfect society.

Just think of all those lawyers and others who would struggle to make a living if the trains ran perfectly, surgeons did not chop off the wrong bits and television stars did not make "bloopers" for endless recycling by the likes of Denis Norden and Terry Wogan.

We all love it when things go wrong.

Newspapers play an important part in this process as fearless exposers of malpractice, incompetence, inefficiency and stupidity.

Not surprisingly, the public takes enormous delight whenever the popular press slip from the standards they believe should be possessed by others.

The only good thing is that newspaper mistakes often add more to the gaiety of the nation than serious misjudgments made by doctors, politicians and police officers.

We in this industry are sanctimonious at our peril and it is humbling when you come across publications such as It Must Be True, Classic Newspaper Howlers, Bloomers and Misprints (Denys Parson. £6.99. Ebury Press).

Thumbing through this collection, as I did the other day, leaves you with the overall impression that most of them are not really all that funny -- like those Are You Being Framed? programmes which show endless clips of people falling down.

But some of them are worth sharing with you.

Particularly the correction which pointed out that a Pontin's holiday camp competition was for elegant grandmothers and not "elephant" grans as stated inadvertently.

Another reads: "In the handicrafts exhibition at Wordsley Community Centre, the contribution of the Misses Smith was 'smocking and rugs' and not 'smoking drugs' as stated in last week's report."

This brings back memories of the time a colleague on another local newspaper was harangued by an angry spinster for getting the title wrong when she addressed a women's meeting about adventures in the jungle.

"Love in a Mud Hut," sounded very interesting but the word should have been "Life."

Elsewhere in the book there are surreal references to the provision of red cossacks for a choir, a couple who exchanged cows in church, the lifting of a tea-stained face, outbuildings which included a petting shed and praise for the man who had the courage to tickle an armed intruder.

My favourite, though, has to be this item from the Elder Gazette in Pennsylvania:

"Miss Nellie Peters received painful injuries yesterday from the talons of a large horned owl which she captured in her bare hands.

"She will be stuffed and mounted and put on display on Main Street."

But here's one which has been missed: "The balmy evening of lovely sunshine brought out the autograph hunters -- as well as a small army of early-summer biting midgets."

Which paper? We could not possibly say.