EGO3 as big as Cadillacs were rushing to pay out sums well into five figures when the DVLA's registration plate auction roadshow hit the Celtic Manor yesterday, as MIKE BUCKINGHAM found out.

Society is multiracial and classless when it come to gloriously bad taste. Orthodox Jews rubbed shoulders with Moslem shopkeepers who were sitting next to well-coiffed ladies from the shires who bidded against blokes with ear-rings and black leather jackets and South London accents at the Celtic Manor.

With the Swansea-based DVLA on a mission to provide as much money for the Treasury as possible, no expense was spared to angle the registrations towards potential Welsh buyers.

W4LES was an early example which went for £6,000 followed by CARI4D at £5,600 and HYW4L at £4,200.

1 TRY was presumably snapped up by the Welsh international rugby side. T4FFS and T4FFY went for somewhere between £3,000 and £5,000 and surprisingly, since it is not immediately apparent what the joke is, 1EEK went to £5,800.

"Buyers are told that they have to conform to the mandatory font. There can be no question of shifting the numbers or letters closer together or making, say, a '4' look more like an 'A' said DVLA information officer Phillip Lawson.

"We have also weeded out the registrations which could be construed as being offensive in any way."

So there isn't anyone with the world's filthiest and most offensive mind, in the world, sitting somewhere in the bowels of the Swansea office and making a list of all the registrations that have to be avoided, then?

"Not exactly. Although we do take care to ensure that registrations are not offensive or indecent in several languages", he replied crisply.

Hard on the heels of the Welsh puns came the name or relationship puns it being noticeable that those with DAD went for slightly less than those with the letters MUM. M1 DAD for instance, went for £4,800 while M1 MUM, possibly after some strong bidding by Oedipus, went to an anonymous buyer for £5,400.

"From when we started selling off registrations in 1989 demand has just soared", said Mr Lawson.

"People don't seem to find it naff so much as a bit of fun. You get all sections of society going in for these plates, the only common denominator being that they've got the money to spend."

An interesting possibility arose that the Welsh Development Agency might have shelled out the £7,200 of taxpayers' money needed to buy WDA 1. Although there was nobody at the quango's headquarters to give me a definitive answer someone in the Press office said: "I don't think the agency would have paid out that sort of money."

Some local excitement was caused when USK 1 came under the hammer and eventually went for £5,600. Frantically scouring the building with a highly-developed sense of Gwent patriotism I was soon brought up short by a veteran of such auctions.

"You're assuming the registration is meant to represent the river," he said knowingly. "But have you ever thought someone might be buying a plate which says 'you ski' for a friend who spends a lot of time on the piste?"

*PICTURED: Delyth Gwilym, of the DVLA, with some of the sought-after number plates.