An unlikely story about Labour putting Gordon Brown's 'hard man' reputation at the heart of its election campaign leads this year's April Fools' stories.

The Guardian claims Downing Street is set to run a national billboard campaign portraying the Prime Minister as "a sort of Dirty Harry figure". One poster shows a glowering Brown alongside the caption "Step outside, posh boy," while another asks "Do you want some of this?", with the pay off line: "Vote Labour. Or else."

Saatchi and Saatchi were said to be also considering reworking posters from classic movies, casting Brown as The Gordfather, the Terminator, and 'Mr Brown' from Reservoir Dogs, or perhaps linking him to Omar Little, the merciless killer in TV series The Wire. Conservative strategists were said to be troubled by internal research suggesting several members of the shadow cabinet - including David Cameron and George Osborne - would not "come here and say that" if challenged by Brown.

Elsewhere, Australian broadcaster ABC put out a spoof interview with an injured David Beckham in which he claimed he was set to join the Australian national team, the Socceroos, as assistant manager to lead them to World Cup glory in South Africa. Virgin Media put out an unlikely press release about employing specially trained ferrets to help deliver broadband to rural areas.

The animals apparently wear little jackets fitted with a microchip able to analyse breaks or damage in the underground network. The AA claimed it had secretly been testing specially adapted jetpacks at Dunsfold Aerodrome, near Guildford, to help patrols get to vehicles in Easter traffic. The name of the quoted AA future technologies strategist, Dr Raif Lopol, was a clue...

The Sun claimed that the newspaper had perfected a new printing process, called Flair Spool, by which it could inject flavours into paper. Readers were urged to taste a blank square on the page and guess the flavour. The patch bore the warning: "May contain nuts." Australian pen maker Artline claimed to be launching a new product - a pen that remembers everything you write, while website HowStuffWorks.com came up with the "twapler", a "stapler that automatically sends a message via Bluetooth or WiFi to a Twitter feed detailing exactly what you're stapling at any given moment".

April Fools' Day dates back centuries, but its origins remain unclear. A widespread theory is that it dates back to the adoption of the Gregorian calendar with the term April Fool applying to those who were still following the Julian Calendar.

I just went into work... that's enough of a joke...

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