The recent inclement weather that has caused heavy flooding in England and Wales, has prompted Prime Minster Gordon Brown to call on construction industry workers, to ask them to consider building any future housing projects on stilts.
Millions of Britain's rivers have swollen and burst their banks with the unseasonal heavy rain, and with more flooding likely in the future, Mr Brown thinks he has found the ideal solution to the problem of receding land mass.
Having visited Asia last year, the PM saw, with his own eyes, the houses built on stilts in China, Thailand and Vietnam, and would like to develop the idea in this country.
Speaking today, Mr Brown said:
"Climate change is with us today. We must build lots of funny houses on legs like those clever Thais do."
He went on to urge builders to construct timber-framed dwellings on bamboo legs, at a height of 10 metres, saying that this would allow, even, for scientists' ultimate worst-case scenario of a 9-metre rise in sea levels by 2050.
"We need lots more affordable housing for first-time buyers", said Brown.
