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Columns

Trash-Cloud Grounds election
Anth Ginn

B
ritain has been under a cloud, trying to sort itself out politically. Both the volcano in Iceland, and the general election have resulted in a very British type of chaos.

First the volcano. When it erupted the airports closed and the media caused everybody to panic. It took a couple of days for the nation to calm down, and realise that it hardly affected anybody. Aircrews had a few days holiday, and lots of families, stranded abroad, had extended holidays.

However, if there isn’t a crisis, the media do their best to create one. All they had to work with were families stranded abroad, staying an extra few nights in the hotel, or coming home on a train instead of a plane. Reporters scoured airports looking for horror stories, but all they could come up with was things like, “This poor family had to sleep on seats in the lounge and live on bottled water, sandwiches and chocolates for three days.”

Try as they could to make it look like a war zone, they failed miserably. They found one poor bloke who had to fork out £1,200 for a chauffer driven limousine to take him from Amsterdam to Calais, where he took the ferry. Nobody thought to ask him why he didn’t take the train and save himself £1,150. A family were interviewed by a crisis seeking reporter just before they boarded. The father was asked, “And what was the worst thing about your trip home?” The man thought for a few moments and replied, “I haven’t been able to change my socks for three days.” Earthquake victims eat your hearts out.

The lack of flights did have a positive side. The residents of West London have enjoyed the peace of not having noisy jets flying over them every five minutes. One person told a reporter, “It’s been wonderful without all that noise in the sky. For the first time in years we can hear the traffic on the South Circular.”

And as the poison, death bringing, invisible cloud of volcanic ash, hung like a giant dagger over the washing lines of the UK, we went into the general election. This time the election was presented like a voter driven talent competition, in the style of, “The X Factor”, “Celebrity Come Dancing”, “The Eurovision Song Contest”, or “Big Brother”, where the viewers watch the candidates do their thing, then vote. At last an election we could all relate to. The three party leaders debated, live on TV, and the nation voted. Hair styles, facial expressions and tone of voice became far more important than economic policy, education or the health service. The next government depended on who looked into the camera, or who had the most sincere smile. And on election night, the computer graphics took over.

The BBC, ITV and Sky, poured millions into turning election night into a three party Avatar. David Dimbleby sprouted wings and horns and flew to the top of a mountain to commentate on the results. Andrew Neill was a giant goblin, who would ask questions to the three elves, then interrupt them, bite their heads off and pop their corpses into a cauldron. ITV went for ‘Dungeons and Dragons’ presentation, where the red monster, blue monster and orange monster fought it out, shooting fireballs at each other in the skies above a ruined castle, representing the UK. The election on Sky was more like an ‘80s version of Pac Man, where the big blue head ran around the screen, gobbling up little red cakes, representing labour party constituencies.

The day after voting, the computer graphics were over and we took stock of the results. The nation had spoken, but unfortunately nobody could understand what it said. The results were up in the air, unlike the UKIP plane, which crashed, injuring Nigel Farage, its European MP. Nigel had to watch the election results from his hospital bed.

Nigel wasn’t the only candidate who was unhappy. In fact by the time the results were in, everybody was unhappy. The Lib-dems thought they were going to get a couple of hundred seats, and ended up with the same amount as in the last election. The Tories thought they were going to be in Downing St next day, but couldn’t get an overall majority and had to hang around outside, knocking on the door. Labour, well, they lost. Peter Robinson, leader of the Unionists in Northern Ireland was shocked to lose his seat, but not as shocked as when he’d arrived home and found his wife in bed with an 18 year old man in the catering business.

There were a few firsts. Three Moslem women were elected, along with Britain’s first Green Party MP. The youngest ever candidate, an 18-year old, stood in Erewash, Derbyshire, on a platform of not allowing parents into their children’s’ bedrooms without knocking, removing tax from pot-noodles, and the constitutional right not to make your bed if you don’t feel like it.

The one party that managed to unite the nation was the British National Party, who turned everybody against them. They lost all their seats, but there was a debate whether this was due to their right wing policies, or their party song, “Christmas is a British Thing.” Check it out on You Tube.

With no single party having an outright majority, we have a hung parliament. This disappointed many people, who thought this involved the gallows. The Liberal Democrats realised they held the balance of power, and went through the fastest transformation in British politics. It took them half an hour to change from a virgin with high principles, to a tart hanging out on the corner of Downing St, twirling her knickers around her index finger. Crying, “It’s for the good of the country,” she hopped into bed with a handful of amylnitrate poppers and David Cameron.

The winds of change are blowing. Britains first female Moslem cabinet minister promptly cut her own benefits and had herself deported. National ID cards have been abolished, because Nick Clegg finally knows who he is. He’s been given the “non-job” of deputy prime minister, and moved into John Prescott old office next to the broom cupboard at the end of the corridor. The combination of Tory Blue and Libdem yellow give impression we’ve been taken over by IKEA. Britain is entering a new era of flat pack government. It’s bound to end in tears.







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