There is a topic, I have to admit, I have been too timid to write about. Lilley-livered. It's not a major, or earth shattering issue. It's not make-or-break. It interests me and takes me to a place I know will be tricky.

There is money involved and the arguments for and against will ebb and flow like a tide on a spring day. In the US, where the Harris Polling Company carried out some research, they estimate it involved one in five people. UK? Dunno but we do know; where the US goes, the UK usually follows.

I'm talking tattoos. Harris Polling tells us:

• At least two in five say that people with tattoos are less attractive (45%) or sexy (39%);
• One-quarter say that people with tattoos are less intelligent (27%), healthy (25%) or spiritual (25%);
• Having a tattoo seems to make little difference in non-tattooed people's perceptions regarding strength and athleticism (82% say it makes no difference).

On the other hand...

• Three in ten people with tattoos say it makes them feel more sexy (30%)
• Most have never regretted getting a tattoo (86%)
• One-quarter say having a tattoo makes them feel rebellious (25%), 21% say both it makes them feel attractive or strong, 16% say it makes them feel spiritual and some say it makes them feel more healthy (9%), intelligent (8%) or athletic (5%).

So, pick the bones out of that! It looks like the very reason people have a Tatt' are the very reasons they shouldn't!

I have to confess I regard the Lilley-Body as something of a temple of perfection and the thought of writing on it makes me wince. As I get older I might contemplate a sign; 'This Way Up' and a bar-code to explain my 30 medications!

A lot of readers write to me with their ideas on how the NHS should be run and in this time of austerity, how it should save money. There is a familiar list and always, somewhere... tattoo removal. Is it an issue?

Following a Freedom of Information Act request from the Sun newspaper, it emerged the NHS has stumped-up £350,000 on tattoo removal. Looks like a significant amount of cash to me. At least until you look more closely.

The figures have been collected for a four year period. So I make that £87,500 a year.

It involved 2,000 people, or about 500 a year. So, five hundred people a year costing us £87,500... isn't that £175 each?

We probably have David Beckham and the Prime Minister's missus (who has a dolphin on her ankle) to thank for that. The Tory Party blue-rinse faithful and football supporters in the same queue...

A figure I can't substantiate but seems to emerge regularly in UK articles, here, four in ten people are said to regret having a tattoo and one in six want them removed.

A drunken night, bad company or an infatuation can leave the unwary with a souvenir for life. I get, absolutely, there will be times when filled with regret, embarrassment, distress and depression losing a Tatt' could make a real difference.

Free on the NHS? In the scheme of things, we are going to have to do a bit better than tattoo removal to find the cash to fill the £30bn black-hole. Perhaps we should look elsewhere...

In 2010 central government received 27,294 FoI requests. If every request costs an average of £293 and takes 7.5 hours to process - (old figures from Frontier Economics) - the spend totals £7.9m, and takes 200,000 hours in research time.

The NHS? More recently cost estimates put responding to FoI requests, across the whole of the NHS, was around £30m.

Maybe we are looking in the wrong place to save money? Information comes with a cost but should we put a price on it? Should we introduce a cost-benefit analysis scoring template for FoI? 

Alternatively, if we took every piece of information the NHS has and put it on a website people could dig for free.

A right to know, of course.  A right to find out?  Certainly.  But, what is the right price and the right way to do it? 

See, I told you it was tricky.

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