One bright idea for helping the chancellor out of his little difficulty with public finances is for public bodies to share accommodation. With efficiency and cultural synergy in mind, what could be more logical than co-locating the police and Crown Prosecution Service? It turns out it is not as easy as that, Steve Mortimore of the National Policing Improvement Agency told a conference on shared services last week. When co-location was tried, in Bristol, the two agencies had to be separated by a locked door – not only for security purposes, but because the difference in ambience caused by the contrast between the police carpet (£12 per square yard) and the CPS carpet (£27 per square yard) was deemed bad for morale.