Security at the Austrian museum where a valuable Celline was stolen last weekend was lax to the point of absurdity. “The Florentine set, valued at about ?50m (£35m), was stolen at about 4am on Sunday. The burglary was bold, but accomplished with ease. Entry through a first-floor window was aided by some convenient scaffolding and the thief then smashed the unprotected glass display case. Entry to escape with the exquisite 25cm object can have taken no more than 54 seconds, according to a police reconstruction. Halfway through that brief period the museum’s alarm system rang. The guard switched it off – before it could have alerted the police – assuming that it was yet another false alarm of the type that occurs in the museum once a week on average. It was left to a cleaning lady to discover the theft more than four hours after the event.”