IT’S an unusual and frankly disturbing feeling.

Gratitude to the Government, mingled with a sense of justice served and common sense winning the day. Weird.

It’s like warming to the school bully or experiencing a sudden blossoming of affection for your mugger.

The Department for Transport’s decision to block Liverpool’s ambitions to use their juicy taxpayer funded terminal to lure away a slice of Southampton’s moneyspinning cruise business took me completely by surprise.

I’d privately imagined it was a done deal – that they would wave it through and Southampton’s marine industry would take yet another state sponsored kick in the rowlocks.

You see favours from this Government have been as rare as a modest expense claim from an MP.

It’s a dismal record.

As a severe slowdown in global trade left swathes of the shipping industry over expanded, vulnerable and teetering on the edge of oblivion, Westminster mandarins decided this was the perfect time to hike taxes.

Light dues, the levy to pay for the nation’s lighthouses, were due a steep rise they said.

These giants in incompetence consulted all and sundry and the answer shone out clear as Eddystone in a force 10: “Don’t touch it, ships will quit British ports in favour of cheaper continental rivals”.

So, naturally, they put it up and to a level higher than they consulted on. Astonishing.

You could hear the howls of protest as far away as Rotterdam, where the Dutch must have been grinning over their Gouda.

Earlier, another genius had decided the recession was the optimal moment to start charging companies based in ports like Southampton rates for the first time.

Unhappy that perhaps that didn’t go far enough, they went on to backdate the move, running up a £3.6m bill for Southampton firms out of thin air.

Finally, they offered no support or encouragement to wind turbine maker Vestas, allowing them to close their facility not only on the Isle of Wight, but its Southampton sister too, resulting in another big hit for the docks, which shipped the blades around the world.

All this in little more than a year and I haven’t even mentioned Dibden Bay.

So, when Transport minister Paul Clark branded Liverpool’s plan “unfair” and agreed it would have an “adverse effect” on rivals, it sounded suspiciously like he’d listened.

Let’s hope it’s habit forming, because the Liverpool decision is just the warm-up.

Like any good monster movie, where the creature comes back bigger and badder in the sequel, part two of this horror show is set on the Thames and the stakes are even higher than they were on the Mersey.

In an unlikely twist of events Thurrock Council is cast as Terminator 2 to Liverpool’s lowly T- 1000.

The Essex authority is now waiting on a decision from the Government over whether it can use taxpayer funds to kickstart the recession-hit £1.5 billion London Gateway container terminal.

It’s a bigger threat to Southampton’s business than Liverpool will ever be and it could go either way.

We’re left to hope the Transport Minister borrows one of Arnie’s favourite lines and says “hasta la vista baby”

once again.