Aliens would take one look at Earth and return home

That's what they want you to think. But after poring over the documents from the final years of the Ministry of Defence UFO desk, there was nothing in them to explain the recurring mystery of the Dorito-shaped object spotted hovering over the West Midlands. It had everything else – the jellyfish over Great Barr, the orange balls that frightened a Coventry springer spaniel, the 'alien army' over Tern Hill in Shropshire. The sceptics would say they were Chinese lanterns. As if.

It's a cover-up. Cameron, Clegg and Miliband – they're all in on it. They might be in league with the aliens and co-operating with their agents ahead of a full scale invasion. Look closely at George Osborne and tell me he isn't from another world.

The alternative is too terrible to even consider. It's not that we're alone in the universe. The collection of galaxies is far too big a place for ours to be the only 'intelligent' life. But really the chances are that any aliens who have come to Earth will have taken one look, turned to each other and said: "Look, darling I know we're tired and have been flying for thousands of light years but it's less than another couple of parsecs to Alpha Centauri and I'm sure we'll find a planet where they aren't watching The Only Way Is Essex."

The problem is that any potential strange visitors from another world will have an out of date idea of what we're about. They'll have picked up the gold record NASA put on the Voyager 1 space probe launched 35 years ago and which contained 'sounds of the Earth' – whale song, Mozart and Chuck Berry singing Johnny B Goode. They think we're a planet of old school rock and roll and Die Zauberflöte, not Robin Thicke and Justin Bieber. Actually, that might be a good thing.

I'd love to believe that there was a group of grey creatures with heads like up-turned eggs floating in a giant tortilla chip (literally corny, I know) and waiting for us to be ready for them to make contact, teach us how to make and wield light sabers, teleport and travel faster than light. But it's not going to happen if we carry on like this.

If there are lifeforms out there capable of travelling the cosmos in search of intelligent life, we'd have to come up with something to offer them in return. Unfortunately we don't have a fat lot going for us in the innovation stakes that can compare with theirs.

We are the people that thought asbestos was a safe material to use in construction and our teenagers think wearing their trousers half way down their underpants is a good look. We can't even make an iPhone with a battery that lasts more than a day.

If we want the universe to take us seriously and not just view our little planet as an obstacle in the way of their hyperspace by-pass, we're going to have to up our game. So let's send up a new Voyager probe and fill it with things that make ET want to phone home and say 'you have to check out this place called Earth' rather than asking for a lift.

The new one needs to be a disc of funny videos off YouTube – that one of the cat playing the keyboard would keep their little grey protuberances clicking the 'replay' button for hours, a DVD of Anchorman and a box of Thornton's toffee. If that doesn't say 'welcome to Earth our new alien overlords' then nothing will.

Just don't send them Justin Bieber. They'll look at him and think they've been here before.

l Keith Harrison returns on July 13