Author’s note: Lucy Kellaway is now a teacher.

The British Government has confirmed today that after the successful trial of its “avoiding difficult questions by bursting into song” strategy it will now be implementing a totally new form of musical democracy.

At the launch of the new initiative, Alastair Campbell the new Government Songsperson, accompanied by several members of the Civil Service press team in a close harmony barbershop quartet answered questions about whether he would be staying in his job by singing “I will survive.” He then referred to the questioner, Lucy Kellaway of the Financial Times as a “Devil Woman, with evil on her mind”

As the surprised looking press pack continued to be serenaded by a medley of popular hits, Mr Campbell was able to confirm that he was confident the Prime Minister would remain in his job until he was 64, that Love would not tear him and Gordon Brown apart and that Alastair Darling’s new transport policy was “Bootylicious”

Under the new form of democracy, debates and questions in the Houses of Parliament can only by sung and that questioners deemed to be “out of tune, of indifferent tempo or generally a bit rubbish” by the “wholly impartial” speaker of the House will be ruled out of order. Within the Commons, show tunes and popular music will be acceptable whereas within the Lords only opera or any of the works of Richard Wagner will be approved.

The Conservatives have issued a furious rebuttal of the Government’s new policy, however. Oliver Letwin, the Shadow Home Secretary, has claimed the Government is terrified of Iain Duncan Smith’s “deep and gravelly baritone, which is ideal for poetry and prose recitals. He is especially good at soliloquies.” However, Labour has responded by claiming that the Conservatives are only complaining because “none of their front bench can hold a tune and Michael Howard sounds like a bloody fishwife being assaulted by a particularly noisy dolphin”

The Liberal Democrats have already tabled an amendment to the new laws demanding that all questions must also accompanied by a “relevant and appropriate dance.” The leader of the Liberal Democrats, Charles Kennedy, is well known as a keen ballroom dancer and possesses every Michael Flatley video, and the director’s cut DVD of Riverdance. Mr. Kennedy demonstrated the new amendment by deftly pirouetting across the Speaker’s chair and then dancing a hornpipe to illustrate the Government’s lack of funding for the Royal Navy.

Independent MP Derek Gadd, a member of the Oswestry Gogol Absurdist Theatre, dressed as a hippopotamus disguised as Batman, to illustrate the plight of residents beneath the Heathrow flight path also tabled a further amendment, but unfortunately ran out of time before Mr. Blair could guess the second word, third syllable that Mr Gadd was frantically miming.

Author’s note: There were the usual levels of elevated hysteria about paedophiles lurking on every corner. I started to write this – but as is obvious from the final line, never finished it.

The Police confirmed today that they were finding it increasingly difficult to cope with the tide of youthful perverts luring older men into chat rooms and grooming them for illicit liaisons, foreign holidays and unlimited mobile phone top up vouchers.

The Brains Trust spoke to Karen Hart, a twelve-year-old schoolgirl from Hampton who regularly poses as a bored 32 year old housewife. Miss Hart explained that she had used internet chat-rooms to secure several luxury trips abroad. Her technique was to target older men “preferably geeky losers with an interest in Star Wars or Lord of the Rings and an IQ of around 35” and, using her pseudonym Oldlita, to engage them in conversation, highlighting her loneliness, sexual frustration and keenness on speaking Klingon. “I learned that ‘Gruddle-al Thurg’ means ‘Take me you bespectacled, bearded love God’ and that’s usually enough to get them hooked,” she explained

At this point, Miss Hart arranges to run away together to a suitable foreign destination. “I took the last one to Mustique. I told him they were holding a Star Trek convention, with a guest appearance by Leonard Nimoy and a full mock up of the deck of the Enterprise. You couldn’t get him there quick enough, although having to travel with someone dressed from head to toe as ‘The Salt Vampire of M-113’ was a bit embarrassing.”

According to Miss Hart, most of her victims are usually too excited at talking to a girl for the first time to become too suspicious about her real age. However, on arrival at her chosen destination she reveals her true age and how she may have inadvertently let slip to the News of the World that she may be travelling abroad with an older man who was “gagging for it.” “When I tell them I’m twelve, they can’t get rid of me quick enough,” said Miss Hart. “They usually pay me a load of cash to leave them alone and that gives me some decent spending money for the holiday. And the last three committed suicide, too, which means I could cash in their airline tickets. Fantastic”

Derek Gadd, 56 year old author of the Lonely Pervert travel guides, was outraged by the tactics of the twelve year olds. “It’s getting so you can’t trust anyone nowadays,” he fulminated. “My internet guides show the best places for the older single man to get a bit of nookie, especially with younger ladies. For example, my Russian Brides supplement was massively successful and topped the Solihull most popular website list for several days. But how on Earth can a man be confident that he’s not going to end up on the front page of the Sunday Tabloids if these brazen harlots are luring the lonely and celibate with the promise of unlimited sex and free science fiction festivals?

I’ve run out of words. Help

Author’s note. There was a fatal railway crash. Everybody overreacted.

The Government today confirmed that it would be prosecuting those responsible for the recent fatal crash involving a public service vehicle and would be immediately implementing a set closures, inspections and repairs which is likely to lead to Britain facing major disruption to travel as the whole country is checked for defective lights, cracks and unsafe junctions.

The crash, which occurred on the M56 motorway, involved several cars and a bus. Whilst evidence is still sketchy, there is speculation that the crash was caused by a break or “pothole” in the surface of the piece of track the vehicle was travelling on. Despite a recent inspection, and repairs using the latest bitumen-gravel complex applied using state of the art blowtorch technology, tiny cracks still formed, eventually merging to produce the “pothole”. The crash occurred when a vehicle hit the pothole at speed damaging the front wheel’s protective rubber casing, causing the driver to brake suddenly. Unfortunately his old model car had not been fitted with the latest “ABS” braking system which, combined with the drivers inexperience caused it to slide sideways into the central reservation resulting in the death of seven travellers.

The deaths caused outrage in the national media leading to calls for the resignation of Tony Blair, Alistair Darling and the Michelin Man. The government promised a measured and thoughtful response with no knee jerk reactions and immediately announced that the entire national road network will be shutdown as teams of experts scour every kilometre the length and breadth of Britain repairing similar faults. Pressure is also mounting for the recall of older, substandard vehicles from daily use as previous investigations have revealed that while an experienced driver in an modern vehicle can be regarded as reasonably safe many older cars and younger drivers are, potentially, lethal.

According to a Government spokesman, the most likely causes of the crash are sabotage, badly trained maintenance operatives and the fact that it was “a bit foggy” when the accident occurred. However, the Police have also been interviewing the driver of the vehicle, Mr. Derek Gadd of Oswestry. Witnesses who observed Mr. Gadd shortly before the crash claimed that he appeared to conducting an animated conversation on his mobile ‘phone, whilst selecting a cassette and attempting to unwrap a Nuttall’s Mintoe. Mr. Gadd has reportedly claimed that he was fully in control of the vehicle and the crash was probably caused by “evil Al Qaeda saboteurs or his ex-wife Carol.”

The Government however is pressing ahead with further safety measures by nationalising all road maintenance companies and private motor vehicles. It is expected to go on to announce legislation taking all bicycles, skateboards and horses into public ownership. When asked whether such measures would really improve road safety, Alastair Darling the Transport Minister commented, “I certainly bloody hope so. These dangerous drivers should have more consideration for the victims and their families, I mean there are hundreds of us stuck here in this bloody traffic jam”.

Author’s note: Iain Duncan Smith continued to have absolutely no impact on eith the Tories, the government or the media

An Englishman has made a miraculous recovery from “the deepest coma the world has known”. Iain Duncan Smith, has laid asleep on the front benches of the House of Commons for almost twenty years, but has recently awakened and is having to contend with a totally changed world.

Mr Duncan Smith fell into the coma after an accident involving his party leader and maternal icon, Margaret Thatcher. After Mrs. Thatcher’s reign came to a sudden and brutal close, Mr. Duncan Smith was unable to accept the reality of the end and fell into a deep sleep.

From this point, Mr. Duncan Smith spent the majority of his time slumbering gently on a sunny spot on the front benches. However, as a somnambulant who also talks in his sleep, Mr. Dunacn Smith was able to continue with his career as a political no-hoper, with no noticeable difference to his prospects.

Mr. Dunacn Smith also exhibited a rare form of contagious narcolepsy, whereby anyone to whom he spoke immediately fell into a deep sleep as well. This decimated the Tory front bench leaving only a collection of slumbering spokespersons, who would occasionally cry out during nightmares about European superstates, losing the Pound and hordes of immigrant darkies. Only a very few Tories were able to escape the malign affects of Mr. Duncan Smith’s affliction including Ken Clark who had become deaf after years of listening to Jazz and Michael Heseltine who has never listened to anyone else in his life and was thus unaware that Mr. Duncan Smith was talking to him.

The miraculous recovery of Mr. Duncan Smith is thought to have come about after extreme shock therapy, whereby he was confronted with a Gallup poll that indicated that the Tories might win the next election, provided no one else enters. After a series of rapid jolts, Mr. Duncan Smith was seen to leap to his feet during Prime Minister’s question time and demand an apology from the Prime Minister.

“If Mr. Major wishes to lead this party into Europe, he will find many in his party will not follow,” he bellowed, before looking confusedly round the chamber. After a hasty briefing from a concerned onlooker, Mr Duncan Smith continued, demanding an apology from the Prime Minister for lying about briefing him on a report on Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction. “How could he have briefed me, I was sound asleep? Anyway, are you sure you’re the Prime Minister, sonny? You look a bit young to me.”

Doctors predict that Mr. Duncan Smith will remain severely disabled for the rest of his career. “He will continue to be lame for the remaining part of his life,” explained top neuro-surgeon Professor Hugo Z Hackenbush. “It is also likely that he will not enjoy a high quality of life. Still, with proper care and sympathy from the Government he can expect to last a couple more years before finally being laid to rest.”

Author’s note: I was obviously becoming obsessed with internet porn

Bachelors across the globe celebrated yesterday as scientists at CERN announced the impending arrival of ‘The Grid’ – the next generation in computer networking – to be brought on-line in two weeks.

The Brains Trust spoke to top-level CERN scientist Dr Jonathan Prince Galvo. “The Grid is a revolution in the way we think about computer networking,” he explained excitedly, as he rapidly drew diagrams of concentric circles on his electronic digital display whiteboard. “The grid will take number crunching away from the home computer, offering remote processing power, applications and data storage on demand. Soon, every man will be able to utilise the power of five supercomputers from the comfort of his own home. Just imagine what that could do? Every aspect of your household could be controlled from your bedroom, leaving a man a lot more time to engage in his favourite hobbies,” he continued, now rubbing his hands rapidly up and down front of his white coat.

“The Grid will have research applications as well. Analysing those terabits of particle accelerator data, for one. Decoding genomes, solving inter-related multi-variable problems – piece of cake! But the real question is: why would anyone ever choose to do that when you can spend 24 hours a day watching utterly debased porn and viewing the new 3D-interactive ‘El Burro Farmyard Gangbang’ flick, with full access rotation and variable zoom? It’s fantastic! It really is!”

The government have thus far declined to comment on the development, though an inside source reluctantly revealed that they have dispatched a team of specialists to look into the matter.

“Completely off the record,” she told us, “the team went to look at a prototype version of the Grid, to study the effects of this explicit and deviant imagery being made anonymously available … They were supposed to report back on Thursday, but they’ve locked themselves in the computer centre and won’t come out. We’re getting quite worried … Some goats have vanished too.”

A number of pornographic production companies are organising new releases – so to speak – in anticipation of the projected demand: ‘Sim Cameraman: Blue Movie’, is due for release exclusively to the Grid in late September, and the Grid version of ‘Buffy the Vampire Layer’, is expected to contain many exclusive features, including a ‘Vampire ResErection’ mode and the infamous ‘Buffy gets staked’ scene that was banned from the original DVD release.

The Grid’s designers have already agreed to set aside 25% of the vast system resources for the “storage, development and promulgation” of porn. Dr. Galvo, however, felt that this may not suffice as demand is expected to grow rapidly, particularly when suitable hardware add-ons for the Grid become available “just as soon as we’ve unstuck the pages in the instruction manual.”

Author’s note: A rather black take on a feel good story.

Following on from the death of the two Iranian twins joined at the head, the worlds media has noticed an upturn in interest for related stories and is now calling for much greater emphasis on “deformities, mutations and other unusual abnormalities”

The search for more people with deformities follows on from the “wholly unexpected” death of the two twins who were undergoing a lengthy and complex operation to separate them. As the operation progressed, the headlines have moved from “Twins joy at life-saving op” to “World mourns tragic twins” enabling extensive longevity of the story and ensuring maximum sales of memorial editions of papers. This has led editors to call for more stories involving people with unusual afflictions. “Let’s face it,” claimed Andy Coulson, Editor of the News of the World. “Malaria and Cholera are just so dull and easy to cure without any high risk, edge of the seat surgery. What the world wants to see is plucky victims with weird medical conditions, fighting against the odds to have complex operations, preferably with lots of white suited surgeons, scientific sounding names and expensive looking machines.”

Speaking on behalf of the Raffles Hospital and Hotel Chain in Singapore, spokesman Dr Loo Choon Yong, justified the massive media coverage of the operation. He explained that it was important to provide “sensitive and insightful news coverage of an important health issue of direct interest to all people who find themselves joined at the head.” Dr. Loo added that the coverage was in no way meant to support his own career or improve the status of Singaporean hospitals and he was confident that Singapore would become a centre of excellence for such operations in the future, especially now that he had signed exclusive marketing rights with News International. He also emphasised that such operations would be key for pushing forward research and education in modern surgical techniques. “We have already assembled some further patients for the new Fox series ‘Emergency 999 special – Freaks in Surgery.’ We’ve got a baby boy with transparent skin, a woman with all over body hair and an African pigmy with three penises. Lucky devil. They will all be on display in glass walled rooms and we are planning on providing educational access to them for interested scholars, with special family rates and big discounts for coach parties”

It does appear that the upturn in interest has had an affect on other areas, with a number of media personalities now developing unusual malignancies to make themselves more interesting. Robbie Williams and Natalie Appleton have announced that they are Siamese twins who are struggling to cope with a career threatening lack of talent and must now undergo surgery to separate their egos. Kate from Big Brother has announced that she is suffering from a chronic shortage of celebrity party invitations and will be seeking treatment for “dangerously low charisma” and Chris Evans has also announced to a shocked world that he will be undergoing surgery to remove his wife after discovering that her youth had developed a tragic wasting disease and is now over 16.”

The Prime Minister, Tony Blair, denied that the Government would be taking advantage of the current interest in deformities, but did confirm that his official spokesman will now be known as “the man with two faces.”

Author’s note: I have literally no idea where this idea came from. Sorry

Right wing religious foundation “The Church of the Christian Ejaculation” confirmed today that it was launching a television network of pornography “solely dedicated to praising the Lord spiritually, orally and, most especially, anally”

“The problem for most men looking for pornography is that they get ripped off by Satan loving fraudsters,” explained the Reverend Chris Jones, lead pastor and chief spiritual advisor to the female congregation of the church. “A man is promised a show featuring a woman, a donkey and battery operated egg whisk and what does he get? Some grainy, communist East European video featuring an agricultural worker and a cookery lesson. It’s a goddam liberty, ‘scuse my language.”

Mr. Jones explained that with “Praise the Lord Pornography” the public will know that the operation is run by “honest, God-fearing white folk” who are as good as their word and keep their promises. Mr Jones went on to assure the public that when his company promised “a gang-bang featuring 15 Nuns and 5 Altar Boys, that’s exactly what they’ll get. And our re-enactment of Christ’s entry into Jerusalem on an ass features no-holds-barred animal action with Mary Magdalene.”

In response to criticisms that pornography had no place in the Christian religion, Mr Jones demurred, asking “What could be more saintly or holy than the physical expression of love between two people. So it follows that between 15 people and a few of the Lord’s other creatures has got to be even holier.” He also promised that actors wont just be restricted to the missionary position, but would be utilising the full range of positions from the Christian karma sutra, including the beatitude blow-job, the gospel gang bang and the ascension anal adventure.

Mr. Jones also promises to do away with “rough language and explicit sexual references, unless in an artistically valid context”. Instead, Praise the Lord Pornography shall also offer quotations from the bible and frequent use of the Lord’s name to emphasise the Godliness of the actors and their activities. Examples include, “God that’s good”, “Jesus you’re big” or, “as it says in the Song of Solomon, ‘Spray your man paste in my open mouth, you horny love God'”

The Brains Trust spoke to one of the actresses from the videos, Sister Henrietta of the formerly Virginal Sisters of Christ. “It certainly makes a change from darning, cleaning and baking Eucharist bread,” she confirmed. “I was a little nervous at first but then Father Jones reminded me that sex outside marriage is not recognised by the church and so this doesn’t really count as sex and can’t be a sin. And of course the bible make no reference at all to lesbianism, so I can do that in my spare time as well as on camera.”

The videos themselves take their plotlines from the sensitive retelling of beloved biblical scenes. “The resurrection is a special favourite of mine,” smiled Mr. Jones. “You wouldn’t believe how quickly he can rise again after he’s been nailing her.” In other storylines, the parting of the Red Sea is revealed as an obvious metaphor for Moses deflowering a virgin Egyptian princess and the parable of the wise and foolish virgins shows how foolish they get with the twelve disciples after Jesus tries out his water into wine trick.

Praise the Lord Pornography will also be offering internet based services including the confessional cam, an on-line web camera where penitents can phone in and request catholic high school girls to act out their sins and beg for forgiveness and punishment. In an unrelated move, the Vatican has reportedly just ordered 2000 internet consoles and the “worlds biggest broadband link”

Author’s note: Obviously the war on drugs and prohibition have been hugely successful and so why not start banning every leisure activity that is dangerous?

Following on from a number of deaths and injuries on various mountains, including the recent helicopter crash on Everest, the Government has announced that it will be adopting a set of laws to ban mountaineering based on its “massively successful” drugs policy

The ban will “protect individuals from themselves,” claimed the Home Secretary, David Blunkett, speaking at the launch of the new policy. Mr. Blunkett, explained that the activities involved “unacceptable risks” to the “reckless and wanton” individuals who indulge in recreational climbing. “They may feel that they are simply indulging in a personal pleasure that doesn’t harm wider society, but who has to pick up the pieces when they fall off a mountain or slip on an icy glacier? The tax payer, that’s who,” intoned Mr. Blunkett. “It is obvious that the only way to protect these people and society at large from their callous clambering is to declare it illegal and force them underground. Which reminds me, I must look into pot holing, too.”

The new policy identifies different mountain ranges and classifies them according to a set of criteria including height, steepness and difficulty of ascent. Class A ranges, such as the Himalayas or Andes, will carry higher penalties than Class B ranges, such as the Pyrenees. These in turn will carry a custodial sentence higher than Class C escarpments, which include the South Downs, Ongar Hill and several large slag heaps in Yorkshire. However, a furious international row has already broken out regarding the classification of the French Alps which Mr. Blunkett has classified as “smaller than Ben Nevis and not really worth bothering about” whilst the French have insisted that the Eiffel Tower is excluded as providing an essential medical function to the “national psyche”

The Government has acknowledged that the policy may hurt a number of poor regions, including South America, Afghanistan and Eastern Europe, around the world who benefit from their status of “mountain growing communities.” However, Mr Blunkett has pointed out the harm the communities do by encouraging the use of “hard rock” and has promised to provide financial assistance for mountain replacement policies. These include helping local communities to pull down “addictive and dangerous” rockfaces and replace them with facilities acceptable to the west, such as theme parks or take away restaurants.

Reports have already started of networks of criminal gangs moving in to offer abseiling, hiking and “full scale climbing” to addicts. Dealers offer a cocktail of “highs” to users and the Government is especially worried that soft activities, such as hill-walking, could be used to lead people into harder recreations. It has promised to put money into replacement theories such as gymnasiums or home-fitness machines.

Reports continue to flood in of desperate mountaineers indulging in burglaries and muggings and international gangs setting up money laundering services and prostitution rings with the cash generated from the supply of illegal climbs. However, the Government declared itself “unutterably satisfied” with the success of the new policy and has promised to bring forward legislation to prohibit other risky solo activities including shot putting and long jumping as well as taking “a good hard look at masturbation”

Author’s note: Claire Short was in the government and then left in a huff and called for Tony Blair’s overthrow, at the time that he was fantastically popular

Claire Short continued with her media blitz today, condemning the Prime Minister as an “evil aggressor” who would “burn in Hell’s flames stoked by Satan himself and roasted by his fiery demons.”

Ms. Short was speaking at one of the many press conferences she has arranged to promote her stance against “President Blair” and persuade the British public that he should be overthrown “as rapidly as possible.” Although Ms. Short claimed that she and her allies would continue to explore peaceful ways to remove Mr. Blair, she refused to rule out “absolute, total annihilation preferably causing maximum collateral damage to his corrupt cabinet of cronies”

Ms. Short, now adopting what was described by a colleague as a “grave and Prime Ministerial tone”, continued, condemning the “current” Prime Minister for hypocrisy, citing his continual promises to make a principled stand on one issue after another and then immediately withdrawing the pledges in a flurry of excuses. “How can we trust anyone who alleges high moral principles and then fails to immediately resign when those moral peaks are not scaled?” she asked.

It appears that Ms. Short has already assembled a group of “Shorties” around her to explore how they can “unmodernise” the party, exploiting new tactics known as “the Fourth Way” to drag Labour back to its roots. “The people are crying out for a return to the old values of Labour,” she declared passionately, standing before an autocue and a group of disaffected MP’s, former cabinet ministers and disgruntled Union leaders. “The nation yearns for the freedoms of high-taxation, public ownership and all-powerful unions that bought us such success in the past. How long can this evil dictator and his craven henchmen be allowed to deny the people’s will by obtaining a massive majority in Parliament and then persuading MP’s to vote for him?”

Reports are also appearing of attempts to build a “Freedom coalition” of like-minded countries supportive of Ms. Short’s aims and opposition to the UK’s regime. These are believed to include Cuba, Iran and France, although Iran is reportedly queasy at the strength of Ms. Short’s rhetoric and bellicose language and is urging moderation.

Mr. Blair himself has become an increasingly isolated figure, finding himself on the extreme wing of the Labour Party preaching a doctrine that most Labour MP’s dismiss as “old new labour.” A figure close to Mr Blair commented, “Poor old Tony. He just sits there with a few old righties, rabbiting on about pledge cards and free-market reforms. He’ll always be outside the real decision-makers in the party – the unions and the public sector. It’s a wonder he’s got the strength to carry on”

However, Ms. Short showed little sympathy, setting up a large podium outside Number 10 Downing Street and then using an “industrial size” loud-hailer and fluorescent barrage balloon to denounce Mr. Blair’s “shameless publicity seeking.” She also continued to demand his resignation “if he has the backbone for it – the pathetic girly coward.” Mr. Blair was said to be considering a new role as spokesman and translator for President Bush.