Author’s note: It was Christmas and what better way to celebrate than with a fat pervert?

Interpol announced today that they had issued a worldwide warrant for the arrest of a man who controls a vast Global conspiracy designed to bring misery and suffering to millions of families. “This man has successfully eluded capture for several decades.” Interpol’s Secretary General Ronald K. Noble explained “Even today, the only thing we really know about him is his code-name: Father Christmas”

George J Tenet, Director of Central Intelligence explained why the public warning had been issued “We ignored the warnings about Bin Laden and we won’t make the same mistake again. All the evidence points to a fanatic who is probably aligned to Muslim fundamentalists. He has targeted only Christian countries or those with a Western influence. He takes all that we in the West hold dear – greed, avarice and our neighbour’s ass – and exploits it for his own ends. Our sources indicate that he may be planning his next big hit on or around the 25th of December. Everyone should be on their guard”

A secret report that has come into the possession of the Brains Trust indicates that ‘Father Christmas’ is thought to have multiple names and personalities that he uses around the world. The names include Santa Claus, St Nicholas and, less frequently, Kevin. The report continues, “We believe he operates from a Central HQ in a remote location – possibly mountainous or arctic terrain – with fanatical followers, known as ‘elves’, building devices of terror for distribution around the world.”

The devices are delivered by sophisticated air transport undetectable by radar. It can move at tremendous speeds to deliver its payload of hundreds of ‘packages’ a minute to unsuspecting innocents. The aircraft, known by the codename Rudolph, uses a sophisticated guidance system nicknamed the “Red Nose”, owing to its development by the Soviets in the cold war and its position in the aircraft’s cockpit.

Over the years, Father Christmas has developed a massive network of agents throughout the world. These people are indistinguishable from the main population, dressing in local clothing and working in everyday jobs. However, at a key time of year, on receipt of the code word “Christmas” in special “Christmas cards” these sleepers become active. They adopt the uniform of the fanatic and set themselves up in stores and grottos all over the world distributing the evil produce of their perverted minds.

Although his followers frequently associate themselves with charities, Father Christmas actually funds his activities in a similar way to other terrorist organisations – with cash from the drugs and sex industry. His principal drug, known as ‘Pixie Dust’, brings on a feeling of well being and creates a hallucinogenic belief in magic. Even worse, it appears to be targeted at children with literature known as ‘Fairy Stories’ explaining its use and effects. Father Christmas himself is believed to indulge his own perversions as a fat, bearded geriatric with a penchant for stockings. One former follower has shown us how he was taught to sit children on his knee and give them toys and sweeties as long as they promise him they’ll “be good”. From his prison cell, Jonathan King has admitted that he used the “red suit of shame” to attract youngsters to his evil den of iniquity.

Tracked down by Brains Trust on a satellite phone, Father Christmas was unrepentant and laughed as he issued the pass code that signals the beginning of dread and mayhem throughout the world “Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas, everybody!”

Author’s note: After 9/11 there was a massive downturn in air travel. Well, it looked like a massive downturn at the time. What was Heathrow’s response? Build a new terminal!

Stephen Byers today warned of massive job cuts in the airline and airport industry and confirmed that he had put the development of Terminal 5 on the fast-track to “take up the slack” in newly redundant air workers. “It is obvious to anyone that the UK is falling behind in the big, empty airport stakes” explained Mr Byers from the cavernous interior of Terminal 4 at Heathrow. I mean have you been to Charles de Gaulle, JFK or even Schipol Airport recently. They’re completely empty. But look at this place” he yelled, pointing at a solitary figure in the far distance. “It’s teeming with people. We need to get our priorities sorted out”.

Mr Byers then went on to outline his plans for Terminal 5 and boosting the airline industry in general. “We shall be instituting a ‘hop-on, hop-off’ system of flights with jets circling the airport continually, ready to land and pick up a passenger at a moment’s notice. Rather than waste valuable time with constructing a new terminal, we shall simply rename Staines as Terminal 5. And we have taken the concerns of local residents about noise very seriously and will be forcibly repatriating them and replacing them with deaf people. If they don’t move, after a couple of years with these continual round-the-clock flights they’ll become deaf and stop whinging, anyway”

Author’s note: Ironically, I’ve forgotten why I wrote this. But it was probably in reply to some Government initiative to remember unsung heroes or similar, which led to our current obsession with rewriting the current inaccurate version of history with another inaccurate by more acceptable version of history. See The Dambuster’s memorial, for example

A report issued by The Department of Pointless Social History at Oxford University today claimed that the UK is in danger of “forgetting all those forgotten people who may have done heroic things that we didn’t know about at the time.” The report highlights the fact that throughout history, heroic acts have been carried out by ordinary members of the public in times of war or cataclysm. These went unreported and as a result very few people knew about them and they have subsequently been forgotten.

Speaking from her office at the University, the author of the report Dr Ruth Figwell asked “How can we forget the unstinting service, devotion and sacrifice of so many heroic men and women in history?” When asked to provide some examples what she meant, Dr Figwell exclaimed “Well of course I can’t, after all we haven’t got the foggiest idea who they are or what they’ve done. If I could, they wouldn’t be forgotten heroes, would they? Duh”

Major General Anthony Brinden-Barges agreed that some sort of monument and remembrance service was appropriate for all the forgotten heroes “It would be similar to the idea of the Unknown Soldier. We could set up some sort of vague, shapeless thing and stand around it once a year to not remember these brave souls.” Speaking from Downing Street a lachrymose Prime Minister welcomed the opportunity to reach out in the most heartfelt and compassionate way to everyone who’s ancestors were touched by heroism and tragedy. “After all, polls show that I get my best ratings when I giving one of my blubbing speeches”

Author’s note: I have long been a supporter of free trade and free movement, an increasingly isolated viewpoint. I’ve also been very suspicious of the aid industry and whether it actually has long term benefits for countries, and especially their unfortunate populations. So this was a musing about that. Interesting to note that this was written a long time before Zac Goldsmith moved from super-rich, tax dodging, foreign holiday loving, Green hypocrite to Tory MP. He was my MP for a number of years, and, I reluctantly admit, did a very good job.

Nations from around the world gathered together today at a secret location to discuss their recent successes and future strategies for a Global free trade agreement on the export of misery, terrorism and death.

In his opening address at the launching of the conference, Kim Jong-il of North Korea, declared that “the globe faces an historic challenge. Never before has there been such a requirement to deliver an equality of misery to all nations”

In his address on behalf of Angola, Jose Eduardo dos Santos, explained; “It is vital for us to be able to keep our people in despair and deprivation. It is only with our populous stamped into the ground that we are able to control them and keep power. Me and my fellow leaders in Zimbabwe, Sudan, Libya and many other dictatorships around the world are in this fortunate situation and it is only right that we should promote the export of the skills of subjugation to other nations”

Tariq Aziz of Iraq agreed; “It is now time to repay both the West and Soviet Bloc for their kindness in supporting us over the years as dictators and despots. They allowed us to spend our meagre resources on weapons and build up massive debts. Even today, they give us enough aid to buy more of their arms. What little is left enables us to keep our starving population dependent on us, without any independent means of looking after themselves. Our global export of terrorism will help me and my brothers to spread this happy state of affairs across the face of the Earth.”

From outside the conference, Zac Goldsmith, Editor of the Ecologist celebrated this victory for common sense. “It is clear that allowing people to trade freely with other countries will bring only disaster to the world. Terrorism is an attack on the evils of big business, western values and capitalism and that attack can only be for the good of humanity. But we in the West must do our bit, too. We must constantly move the goal-posts for global trade and impose new regulations – on the environment, child labour, workers rights or anything else we choose – on any other people, no matter how wretched. This will prevent them from moving to an evil environment ruining, capitalist state. And I should know, as it’s what my Daddy used to tell me after he’d made his millions from global trade”

Pierre Bouchet of the Global Anarchist-Green Alliance agreed: “Democracy clearly hasn’t worked in the West as it’s allowed McDonalds to prosper. This evil giant is funded by millions and millions of misguided individuals who walk through their doors everyday and hand over their money for a hamburger. This is obviously against the wishes of the masses and those wishes should be imposed on everyone by regulation and restriction of freedom”

Farmers leaders and textile magnates from Europe and the US also welcomed the conference. “Poor Western farmers and textile companies cannot hope to compete with the ruthless efficiency of African agriculture or the Asian clothing industry. We must be protected from these millions of so called poor who are poised ready to grab for themselves what we have in the West – education, health and liberal democracy – by working hard for lower wages than we are prepared to pay ourselves. These greedy charlatans must be stopped at all costs”

At the end of a hard session of negotiation it was announced that the first plank in the agreement had been reached, with the West and Afghanistan reaching a long term agreement on trade in terrorism and bombing, allowing the citizens of both countries to lead more fearful, unhealthier and less productive lives.

Author’s note: As we have seen under the leadership of Ed Milliband and Jeremy Corbyn, an ineffective opposition is a disaster for democracy which ultimately leads to Governments doing fantastically bad things. So, even though New Labour were generally doing sensible things (apart from Tony Blair’s support for the Euro), there was very little scrutiny and I worried that bad things would happen. And then we invaded Iraq.

This was a musing upon a disastrous Tory opposition which started off very silly and ended up very dark indeed. It was, I think it was, in hindsight, rather prescient.

The Government announced the conclusion of it’s long awaited report on House of Lord’s reform today, revealing that it has gone much further than originally expected and was “chucking bog standard democracy in the bin and re-inventing it for the modern day”

“All that old Greek stuff is out of date and irrelevant to our focus groups of twentysomething media personalities” claimed Alastair Campbell, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman. “New Labour, New Democracy is our motto. We shall be adopting the third way to representation – neither autocratic, nor democratic. A totally new approach that we call Blairocratic, taken from the Latin word Blairus meaning “shared responsibility”.

When accused of “just making that word up” by a journalist, Mr Campbell insisted that any similarity between the new democratic form and the Prime Minister’s name was merely a happy coincidence. As the journalist was helped from the room by two 6’6″ male nurses after he had “banged his head”, Mr. Campbell continued, “Blairocracy will be a more flexible doctrine, able to adapt to the changing needs of the electorate and the Government as they emerge. Under the new system the House of Commons will have overall primacy for the legislature, unless, of course they choose to do something that is not in the interests of the Government…I mean British People. In such circumstances, we will invoke the new upper chamber, which will be known as Lords-U-Like. This will be populated by a fully independent set of carefully vetted Government cronies who will be issued with a large rubber stamp saying ‘Passed'”.

Mr. Campbell then went on to outline how new laws will be implemented. “Ideas we want to carry out that do not have popular support, such as the Euro, will be subject to a Referendum. Referendums will only be held where the questions are ambiguous enough to allow the Government to select the ‘right’ answer, regardless of the result

On the other hand, ideas that have popular support but we don’t agree with, such as the banning of fox hunting, will be passed through committees until they run out of Parliamentary time. Blairocracy, will even touch freedom of information, via our new Ministry of Information, and citizenship. Immigrants will be required to take a citizenship test and learn everyday phrases such as ‘Vote Labour’ and ‘Tony Blair for President’. Citizens will notice a smooth but rapid transition to the new regime. We’re thinking of calling it our Blair Hall Putsch”

Mr. Campbell assured citizens that they had everything to gain from the new initiatives. As the press conference finished and Ministry of Information workers helped the journalists by checking their notes, he explained, “With the current world crisis, it is important that we achieve strength through joy.” As his eyes flashed and the strains of Nimrod started to play in the background, Mr Campbell concluded “Blairocracy is more than a doctrine, it is a way of life. We must all conform to it. And those that cannot will be helped to reform through re-education camps.” Outside the windows, the first train to the re-education camps pulled away.

Author’s note: Third time lucky! I abandoned previous efforts to satrise how boring IDS was by pointing out how boring he was, and simply went for the tried and tested switcheroo. It worked and was the lead article that week.

After his fifth headline grabbing speech and continual appearances on television and radio, Iain Duncan Smith deflected criticism of his massive media presence by Tony Blair as “sour grapes”.

“Mr. Blair should get out and make his own way in the world” retorted Mr Duncan Smith after a leaked memo from Downing Street entitled “IDS must die!” appeared in the papers this morning. The memo pointed out the near saturation of all forms of media by Mr Duncan Smith and his charismatic front bench team. Mr Blair is reported to have shut himself away in a small cupboard in Downing Street and is refusing to come out until “somebody makes Duncan Smith go away”. In addition to his disappearance from the media, Mr Blair is scarred from the devastating debating skills displayed by Mr Duncan Smith during their parliamentary skirmishes. “He keeps getting creamed by IDS at every meeting” said an exasperated ministerial aide. “And as for his shadow front bench team, there isn’t anyone who wants to go out and face them. It’s like facing 15 Russell Crowes in Gladiator”

Outside of the UK, Mr Duncan Smith is facing increasing demands on his time to attend peace-keeping rallies, photo calls and joint press conferences with world-leaders from all parts of the geo-political spectrum. George Bush has been relying almost solely on the support of Mr. Duncan Smith, reportedly asking Donald Rumsfeld and Colin Powell why they can’t summon the same levels of military, business and political insights to deal with the current world situation. Ariel Sharon and Yasser Arafat are refusing to attend any meetings unless facilitated by Mr Duncan Smith and Kofi Annan has reportedly asked to step down as UN Secretary General in favour of IDS.

Within the media, it now seems certain that Mr. Duncan Smith will be Time Magazine’s man of the year and his appearance as the saviour of the Philosopher’s Stone in a surprise twist at the end of the Harry Potter film will further improve his ratings.

Mr. Duncan Smith issued a modest but forthright statement about his domination of the world’s media and likely accession to leader of the free world, “The world needs practical solutions to today’s problems, and today’s Conservatives can offer those solutions.” This has led to an immediate quadrupling of Tory Party membership. He continued “Although, I have been approached by the Nobel Committee to accept all of their available prizes for next year and despite my impending beatification by the Vatican, I intend to continue in my current role as most recognised world leader for the foreseeable future”

Downing Street declined to comment but the White House issued a statement which said, simply, “What a guy!”

Author’s note: This was my second attempt to satirise poor IDS and pinched some bits from the earlier article. It was also immediately rejected by Tom for being “too meta”, which nowadays would almost certainly ensure a successful career as an Instagram influencer

Exasperated comedians and satirists have confirmed that they have given up their attempts to satirise Iain Duncan Smith as “too bloody difficult”

“It’s impossible.” stated Rory Bremner, red-eyed and unshaven after spending 3 consecutive days and nights trying to modulate his voice to the anodyne anonymity of Mr. Duncan Smith’s tones. “There’s nothing there!” he sobbed “Nothing. No personality, no inflections, no nervous tics, not one fucking thing that anyone can use to impersonate him”

Ian Hislop and Paul Merton, similarly exasperated, concurred. “He just agrees with everything the Prime Minister does and sits down” they claimed. “He’s completely invisible otherwise. And as for the shadow-cabinet, there isn’t a personality amongst them. Whatever happened to Widdecombe, Clarke and Heseltine? We’d rather be asked to come up with some one-liners about Belgium than face this lot”

Alarmed Conservative Party officials, who were relying on satirists to get them back in the news, have started resorting to increasingly desperate measures to ensure his appearance on the late night comedy circuit. An initial attempt to get Mr. Duncan Smith to feign a heart attack during a speech in the House of Commons backfired when no one noticed – including his own front bench – as they had all fallen asleep beforehand.

A party insider explained how a subsequent attempt to woo the media by substituting Mr. Duncan Smith with a more interesting alternative had also backfired. “We got hold of a show-room dummy and put him in one of Iain’s suits. We then trained Anne Widdecombe’s parrot ‘Oswald’ to repeat a few of Tony Blair’s policy statements so he could sit in the dummy and act as the voice. Unfortunately, the press became suspicious as the dummy was a bit too animated and kept asking the front bench to give him a cracker.”

Another plan to get William Hague to stand in for Mr. Duncan Smith was hatched after confused party members saw them sharing the stage at the party conference and assumed that they were seeing double after the Darby and Joan Tea Dance and Pink Gin-a-thon the previous evening. However, at a secret trial in front of an invited audience of party members, Mr. Hague immediately disagreed with the Government’s policy on everything. Mr Duncan Smith, who was waiting in the wings, then shouted, “Steady on, that’s a bit off! I think the Government’s doing an excellent job!” An unseemly tussle then ensued on the stage and boggle eyed members had to be helped from the room muttering “It’s like something out of Star Trek. That’s definitely the last angostura bitters for me”

Mr. Duncan Smith has issued a press statement allegedly refuting claims that he has no personality, but no one can be bothered to read it.

Authors note: Everyone was rather surprised when the Home Secretary actually bothered listening to its advisors about drugs and decriminalised cannabis use. At least for a short period of time. The Northern Irish Peace Process also ground on. What better idea than to combine the two bits of news?

It was revealed today that the Government had simultaneously pushed forward UK drugs law and the peace process in Northern Ireland by relaxing the rules on cannabis and then issuing large spliffs to all Northern Irish negotiators.

During a hastily assembled press conference at 2AM in John Reid’s flat where the lead negotiators had all returned having experienced the munchies, Gerry Adams explained the thinking behind the latest initiative. “I just had a long pull and suddenly the whole thing seemed like a real drag, you know? All those guns and bombs and declarations and all that stuff. I just turned to Marty and told him it was all just too much hassle.” Mr Reid signalled his agreement as he looked up proudly from a six inch spliff he had just rolled, “Look at that, man” he added “Awesome!”

David Ervine of the Progressive Unionist Party explained the Unionist position as he poured milk over his bowl of Cornflakes “It’s just like Gerry says. I, like, really love him, man, you know? I mean really.”

David Blunkett, who was speaking from the basement after being led there as a joke by Martin McGuinness pretending to be Mr. Blunkett’s guide-dog Lucy, went on to explain that the initiative could have wider reaching consequences. “Even as I speak, US Peaceplanes are dropping red-cross parcels of cannabis all over Afghanistan. We will be encouraging Taliban fighters to light up for peace. Christ, man! Your flat really smells”. After it was explained to Mr Blunkett that the drops weren’t really necessary, as Afghanistan was already one of the major suppliers of cannabis to the world, he commented “Bummer!”

The move was immediately condemned by Ian Paisley, however. “I will not be party to this Godless idolatry of drug culture.” he bawled, clutching a bottle as he stormed into Mr Reid’s flat and threw open all the windows. “Never will a drug pass my lips or enter my body. The heady scent of marijuana has been the cause of thousands of addicts and hundreds of broken homes. For true Unionists, the calming influence of Scotch Whisky shall be our only solace” He then took another draft from the bottle and asked Mr. Adams, “What the fuck are you looking at? You want a slap, then, you Papist fucker?”

Experts have expressed some alarm over the combination of the two initiatives. Derek Gadd of anti-drugs group, Nanny State explained “All the evidence shows that even moderate use of cannabis can have dramatic effects; psychosis, clinging to irrational beliefs and continually harking back to the past. Actually, thinking about it, you might not notice the difference.” He also pointed out that the drug can cause severe memory loss, “I mean they might not be able to remember where any of the arms dumps are…hang on a second…pass round those reefers immediately”

The Brains Trust attempted to contact the Prime Minister in Downing Street for his comment but was told that he had “just popped out for some Rizlas”.

Author’s note: The Tories were becoming completely invisible and ineffectual, ground under by the New Labour PR bulldozer and the charisma black hole of Iain Duncan Smith. We were trying to satirise them and this was my first attempt which was roundly rejected by Tom for being “unoriginal and dull”. I rather liked it – especially the Matthew Parris gag. Also note, this was around the time IDS started having voice problems and famously croaked through various speeches – an affliction of other Tory leaders, too.

Bemused Conservative Party officials today confirmed that after several days of becoming increasingly difficult to see by the media, their leader, Iain Duncan Smith, had now completely disappeared.

“He seemed to be getting a bit blurred at first” commented press spokesman Nick Wood “But nobody really took any notice of that as, well, no one really took any notice of him in the first place. Then things started to get really bad when he turned up to a press conference and not only did no one stop talking, which is usual, but no one from the press noticed him at all. When this disembodied voice suddenly started droning on about ‘Compassionate Conservatism’ it gave everyone a nasty turn – especially Max Hastings from the Standard who had drifted off to sleep after a couple of clarets over lunch”.

The visual disappearance of Mr Duncan Smith was then followed by the loss of his voice. “At first we could keep track of him by following his voice around the room and seeing who started dropping off to sleep.” continued Mr Wood “But then his voice just seemed to get thinner, as if he’d been breathing helium, and disappeared in a loud squeak last Thursday just as he was explaining his views on interest rates to a snoring Michael Ancram.”

The sudden invisibility of Mr. Duncan Smith could not have come at a worse time for the party. Mr. Duncan Smith was on the eve of launching his new policy for the Tories: ‘Conservatives – we’re just like the Government – only more so’. “It’s a huge leap forward for Conservative party thinking” he had commented at the time “We have finally given up any pretence of having any ideas of our own and just want to prove to the electorate that we’re desperate to get back in power”. New policies were said to include “We love public services”, “There’s room for queers in the Conservatives” and “Europe? Never heard of it”

Tory party HQ has now embarked on a series of desperate measures to ensure that Mr Duncan Smith will not be missed. A party insider explained, “We got hold of a show-room dummy and put him in one of Iain’s suits. We then trained Anne Widdecombe’s parrot ‘Oswald’ to repeat a few of Tony Blair’s policy statements so he could sit in the dummy and act as the voice. Unfortunately, the press became suspicious as the dummy was a bit too animated and kept asking Matthew Parris to give him a cracker.”

Another plan to get William Hague to stand in for Mr. Duncan Smith was hatched after confused party members saw them sharing the stage at the party conference and assumed that they were seeing double after the Darby and Joan Tea Dance and Pink Gin-a-thon the previous evening. However, Mr Hague showed a worrying tendency to own a personality, which made the difference between the two easy to spot on close examination.

Media representatives were more sanguine however. Lord Wakeham of the Press Complaints Commission, replying to an enquiry from the Brains Trust about the disappearance of Ian Duncan Smith from the media, responded “I’m sorry? Who?”

Author’s note: It’s fair to say that most of the contributors to the Brains Trust were left or centre left, with the exception of me, who was centre right. The Government announced a plan to renationalise Railtrack and it seemed likely that they would then go ahead and renationalise the entire network. This was seen to be very good news by everyone at the Trust (and was very popular in general) – except me. It says something for the magnanimity of Tom, the editor in chief, that he made this the lead article despite not agreeing with it. He just felt it was an original take that ridiculed the current consensus. Surely the very definition of satire.

The Government today announced that it was instituting a plan to return the railways of Britain to ‘the good old days’ by re-nationalising them immediately.

As small children dressed in freshly laundered smocks and sailor suits waved tiny flags whilst being carefully watched over by their nannies, Stephen Byers, the Transport Secretary announced that Railtrack would be re-nationalised and re-launched as ‘that bastion of excellence in railways – British Rail’. Tearful commuters recalled the years of high investment in the rail network by Governments from the 1940’s to the 80’s; the superb punctuality, frequent addition of new stations, friendly staff and high quality catering. Mr Byers continued, “It’s obvious that free markets can’t work in a system like the railways. Capitalists are greedy exploiters whose only interest is profits. Anyone can see that the only way they can make profits is by killing passengers and completely disregarding safety. Just look at the appalling safety record of our airlines.”

Mr Byers went on to announce a string of initiatives to “bring Railtrack back to the level the public deserves”. The nostalgiaticket will be sold for a guinea and include a pint of whelks, a cloth cap and 20 Woodbines. Three travelling classes will be introduced and only steam engines will be used on the rail network. Finally, railway guards will be required to undergo an image-change programme and develop a portly physique, a permanent rosy-cheeked smile and have shiny brass buttons on their neatly pressed uniforms. All minority groups will now not be allowed to have ‘customer facing’ roles unless they can display an amusing caricature of their ethnicity. Mr Byers was particularly keen to see “wobbly headed Indian Porters or Singing Jamaican Guards like you get in the wartime films”

Vernon Hince, acting General Secretary of the RMT union, was overjoyed at the announcement. “This is a great day for labour relations in the UK” he declared “Public services should be owned by the public and run for the benefit of the public. I mean you only have to look at how successful labour relations have been in public sector organisations like the London Underground…er, no I mean the Post Office…well anyway take it from me, it’s much better.” He also went on to demand that there should be “full compensation for shareholders in Railtrack, or, at least the ones in my Union”

Conservative transport spokesman, Eric Pickles, declared that the Government had not gone far enough. Wiping a tear from his eye as he recalled the idyllic strike free days of the 1970’s he explained “The new compassionate Conservatives now have a real empathy with the people. We would put far more money into public services because we believe that’s the most effective way to run an organisation. The only solution is to set about re-nationalising all of the UK’s industry. Under a Conservative Government the public can look forward to a return to the National Coal Board, the Gas Board and British Leyland”

Mr Byers concluded by reiterating the Governments commitment to public services and public funding. “As long as the steady hand of Government is controlling matters the public has nothing to fear – just look at our record in running the Health Service, Millennium Dome and building a National Sports Stadium”