Party Political Practice
Monday 1st April before Noon
A man came running out of number 10 Downing Street. He screamed, ‘Someone’s killed the Prime Minister!’ He said it several times, but no-one took any notice. Two policemen just looked at him as if he was just a crackpot and one of them spoke to him.
‘Come on Sir, move along you’re causing an obstruction!’
‘Didn’t you hear what I said?’
‘Yes sir, very amusing.’
‘Don’t you care about our Prime Minister being murdered?’
‘Yes of course I do,’ the policeman looking at his colleague. ‘We all do. But he hasn’t been murdered has he, now be honest. We all know the date today and it is before 12 noon. It’s April the first.’
‘I tried my very best, I wanted to bring a little zest and excitement to my new job.’
‘Nice try Chancellor – but you’d better get back to your office and sort out the Police Pensions you promised to do last week, as I recall from the private conversation we had in the “Coffee Pot Shop.” I hope you haven’t forgotten, I’ve told the lads you are going deal with it, don’t let me down, if you do, the Prime Minister won’t get any of our votes and he’ll want to know the reason why and we will point our fingers in your direction.’
Tuesday 2nd April 8 am
The Prime Minister gave instructions to builders, who built over night – “Stocks.” The Chancellor has been placed in the stocks and selected members of the public who were good at hitting their targets had been invited to throw rotten tomatoes and stale eggs at the Chancellor all day. The member of the public who scored the most bulleyes than anyone else would be knighted or made a Dame and given pocket money of a thousand pounds every week for the rest of his or her life. Needless to say, the contest was fiercely fought and underhand tricks had not been ruled out. The Police were invited to join in, but declined because of a Pension Clause.
Wednesday 3rd April 8 am
The Prime Minister had a lie in, having forgotten to put the alarm clock on and eventually emerged at 12noon and gave the order for the Chancellor to be released. A second wave of the public who had taken over from the first selected group continued to throw rotten tomatoes and stale eggs from 8am until 12noon and demanded the same rewards. The Prime Minister pointed out that if they had read the small print – the deal was for 24 hours and not for four hours. A member of the public pointed out that there was no small print to be read.
‘There you go!’ said, the Prime Minister, ‘It was so small you couldn’t see it, better go to “Spec Savers” next time!’
Thursday 4th April
The Chancellor got up early, snatched a mug of tea and toast and marmalade and headed for his office to try and catch up on the work that had lain in his “IN TRAY” since Tuesday. He was annoyed that the Prime Minister made him a laughing stock for a day and a half. He thought he saw a joke in what he thought, but his brain was not functioning properly.
The Commissioner of Police arrived and was ushered into the Chancellor’s office. The Chancellor was on the phone and nodded to his visitor to sit down. After thirty minutes had lapsed the Chancellor replaced the handset. Sorry about that, terribly important phone-call. I know why you’ve come, you want to chat about the Police Pension! The Commissioner grinned and said, ‘Congratulations are in order. I understand from one of my men you were made a Pillar of Society yesterday.’
The Chancellor retorted, ‘Ha, Bloody Ha! How can you be so rude to say that to me, don’t you know what happened to me yesterday, don’t you read the papers?’
‘No! I don’t read the papers, you can’t trust what they print. The front page is always a screaming sensational headline and it wasn’t true what they printed about me. I didn’t have an affair with Lady Gore, it was a fissure of lies.’
The Commissioner of Police stopped speaking, becoming aware he was blurting out his excuses to someone who didn’t know about his indiscretions with the opposite sex. ‘A man in my position has to maintain a certain amount of decorum.’
The Chancellor seeing a joke that he had heard of a long time ago, seized the opportunity of saying, ‘That’s what you do to apples before eating them!’
’What are you waffling on about?’
‘You know, de-core them – apples.’
The Commissioner of Police was not amused by the joke and stormed out of the office forgetting that he had not put across his plan to the Chancellor about the Police Pension he wanted him to consider, but he had left all the paperwork for the Chancellor to read.
The Chancellor saw the briefcase, it was lush black leather, just what he was looking for but couldn’t afford to buy one, because they were too pricey for his budget. He must have word with the Prime Minister about his pay as Chancellor of the Exchequer, he was sure he should get more than £50 a week.
He took the contents from the briefcase and threw them in his waste paper basket and replaced some documents of his own and tucking the briefcase under his arm he went to one of his private rooms to have his coffee and his usual Ginger Nut biscuit.
As he dipped his Ginger Nut into his coffee to make it a lot softer for his ill fitted National Health dentures to cope with, the Chancellor spread out the papers he had in his new found briefcase. “The master plan: How to get into Number Ten Downing Street by other means?” The Chancellor scratched his near balding head for some sort of solution. He was determined to murder the Prime Minister as soon as he was granted a wage increase. It was a bloody cheek of the high almighty Commissioner of Police putting across the police pension plan. It was fun talking to nobody for half an hour.
Friday 5th April 10 am
The Chancellor had a bit of lie in, he hadn’t realized what the time was as the last thing he liked to do was play computer games. It was two in the morning when he with his hot cocoa and ginger nut biscuit finally went to bed. He had overslept and someone was banging on his door and the shrillness of the bell echoed around the house. Yawning he reached out with his feet the pretty coloured pink slippers with the bows on top and shuffled down to the front door. He couldn’t afford servants or a chef and had no wife. The last girl-friend he had said, ‘She wouldn’t touch him with a barge pole.’
Bleary-eyed he opened the front door and found two policemen on his doorstep. They informed him that someone had killed the Prime Minister. ‘Oh damn it all, I told the milkman to leave me some cream this morning.’ The policemen looked at each other and one said to the other, ‘Perhaps he didn’t hear, he hasn’t got his hearing aid in!’ ‘Look at my newspaper all shredded up, I bet it’s that bloody dog at No. 12. With the newspaper clutched in one hand and two pints in the other he closed the door with his foot and wearily walked to the kitchen, sat down, placing the milk on the table. He spread out the newspaper and saw the headlines.
“Prime Minister Slain”
The Chancellor started reading the report – “Prime Minister slain while walking his dog yesterday evening. A police spokesman stated that the Downing Street Special Branch Police Authority called a lightning strike because of the reduction of their Pension Plan by the Prime Minister up to 50%.”
The Chancellor thought: ‘I bet it was his bloody dog that ripped my newspaper to pieces.’
He read on: “England in turmoil over who was going to take over? Brussels have stepped in and suggested their Prime Minister should take over as he was practically ruling England anyway.”
The Chancellor threw down the paper in disgust. The Chancellor thought his hearing aid was playing up, he could hear all this noise and then realized someone was leaning on his bell and hammering the knocker furiously.
He crept to the front door and through the letterbox he announced to the police outside that he was going to have his breakfast of shredded wheat, a boiled egg with bread soldiers and a mug of coffee.
‘But Chancellor you’re in charge now.’
‘I am?’
‘Yes!’
‘Hold on a moment.’
The door opened and the Chancellor still in his pyjamas walked from his house to No. 10, went in and closed the door behind him and said to one of the officials, ‘Will you send my breakfast up on a tray, it is breakfast in bed for me, must get my strength up to deal with the problems of the world now that I am Prime Minister.’
Saturday 6th April 6 am
The new Prime Minister threw his alarm clock out of the window which woke up the armed police guard outside No. 10. The newly appointed Prime Minister, also known as The Chancellor ensured the Police had their Pension Plan passed by Parliament making sure there were only a few members in the house and a majority of five to one passed the bill. With the police re-instated in Downing Street it was a safe place to be. The body of the original Prime Minister and his dog were taken away in an ambulance. The dog was okay but wouldn’t leave his master’s side and growled menacingly when someone tried to uncurl the P.M’s hand holding the leash. ‘Let “We Are Pets” sort out the problem,’ said the new Prime Minister.
The new Prime Minister called a meeting and as they all gathered round the table, he said ‘Before we all sit down we will stand for twenty seconds as a mark of respect for him who has just perished and two minutes for the dog who had to put up with his quirky ways.’
‘Prime Minister, are you going to appoint another Minister to take over your former role as Chancellor of the Exchequer?’
‘No! I think I can manage both jobs – Prime Minister in the morning and the Chancellor in the afternoon, should be a doddle. I have come up with a better idea so that I can stay indoors dealing with “Home Affairs” and the men who have volunteered to be me are undergoing plastic surgery and as of next week will be in the limelight going abroad and having discussions with foreign ministers in different countries and if at any time they get assassinated another volunteer will take their place.’
‘People will know about them being killed, surely Prime Minister?’
‘Just mere details, we’ll think of something.’
‘Won’t they know when they see the coffin?’
‘That’s a good point! Perhaps we could say the P.M. likes to travel by coffin, he feels safer in one of those. Yes I think that answer will suffice.’
‘But……..Prime Minister!’
‘No buts, there’s a good lad.’
The Prime Minister whispered to his neighbouring Minister and said, ‘Who’s he who keeps asking questions?’
‘He was the other Prime Minister’s right hand man.’
‘He’ll have to go and the sooner the better – see if we have new promotional position in the lateral sense.’
‘I’ll do that straight away Prime Minister.’
‘Now the preliminaries are over – what’s happening on the home front?’
* * *
A Sunday in the future
Mrs. Baxter visited her father in the “Sunnyside Up Care Home.” She signed the book as usual and was just about to go to his room when a Care Nurse approached her and said how sorry she was that Mrs. Baxter’s Father had passed away peacefully just after the first visitor of the day.
Would you like to see your Father?’
‘Yes!’ said Mrs. Baxter.
As the nurse was taking Mrs. Baxter along the corridor she was speaking all the time and saying that the person who called was very important and spoke briefly to her father this morning.
‘Who was the visitor?’
He said he was the Minister for Home Affairs and he left a message written on the wall and Vera Baxter only noted the last few words, ‘It said what?’
‘See for yourself.’ said the Nurse.
The room was cool and the curtains drawn together and the nurse pulled them apart and on the wall written in bold pencil.
”the old bugger’s gone at last!”
‘But what I can’t understand, said the nurse, ‘Is the broad smile on your Father’s face.’
‘When he first came to the Nursing Home aged 95, I told you he was a Member of Parliament, but he was more than that, he was our Prime Minister and Chancellor – and at a 105 years old, he looks like he won the race after all.’