I had the idea for The Minister for Traffic Lights at the corner of Punt Road and Swan Streets in Richmond, sometime in 2002. The lights were interminable, and I had plenty of time to ponder the ubiquitous, uniform nature of the traffic light lantern. ‘What if somebody tried to introduce a fourth, light?’ I thought. ‘That’d shake things up a bit.’ I then had to choose a colour for my fourth light, and naturally went with ‘mauve’, which is the funniest word in existence.

Mauve lights stop fights

The Minister for Traffic Lights is the keenest Minister in the land. He lives and breathes traffic lights. Red, green and amber are his life. But when he has to come up with a cure for road rage, maybe it’s time for a more colourful approach. Maybe it’s even time for a traffic light revolution!

A lighting design company called ‘Electrolight’ made me an actual mauve traffic light!