News Round Up with John Parsons

'Who cares about Ireland?' That's the question Prime Minister Tony Blair addressed in London yesterday.

Mr Blair was speaking of a bold new initiative to end the conflict in Northern Ireland, detailing the government's

proposal that the country should embark on, what he's calling, 'a countdown to extinction.'

The measures will enforce a countdown period, after which, Ireland will be carefully bombed out of existence in

an attempt to get to the source of the problem.

Starting at 10, the countdown will descend each time a person is murdered in the name of the struggle to

free/defend Northern Ireland. At zero, all Ireland will be laid to waste.

Ministers have pointed out that the terrorist problem is mainly due to families who have grown up to be

terrorists and have no other skills. One simple Irish man said today, 'Babies born with orange, white and

green blood know nothing other than England stole a bit of Ireland and that we want it back.' Meanwhile the

British people who moved in and stole Ireland seem to think that because they live there, they are Irish, and

they like things as they are.

Some people have said that the war is yet another example of conflict motivated by religion, but others don't say that.

Tony Blair continued by pointing out that no people in Britain cared about the occupation of Northern Ireland any more and that these were generous measures given that, if he had his way, he'd do the job himself tomorrow with a penknife.

Opportunity

Not wanting to miss an opportunity, the government have released their plans for the blackened, barren remains of

Ireland. A white paper today, told how the country will be repopulated with criminals; much as Australia is today.

The Justice minister pointed out that with space like that, the courts can afford to be far less lenient on crime. He

said, "by the middle of this decade, crime will simply be punished with a ticket to Ireland." He later added, "for a

country with such a long history of crime, it will be a fitting memorial to the few innocents who'll die when this

countdown is complete."

Last night, in the village of Kingsclere, Police and Firemen battled a huge, two-dimensional incarnation of

Disney's first animated character, Steam-Boat Willy. The creature was accidentally brought to life by a group

of children aged between 9 and 11.

The children, all avid fans of evil genius Marilyn Manson, were gathered around a late night campfire in an

attempt to save their youth club from closure. A child detailed their plans, "We thought we could bring some

Pokemon to life and then use them to help save the club. We didn't want to use their powers or anything, we would just sell them to collectors who'd keep them in cages." He continued. "We saw a Cliff Richard movie that was a bit like this situation but without the satanic re-animation of cartoon characters. Marilyn Manson is a little bit more evil than Cliff, but in many ways they're the same."

Problems arose when the children began to read the spells the Manson fan club had sent them. These spells contained some very long words, unsuitable for the kind of children who think this kind of plan will work. 'We would have asked our parents to help us,' said one girl, 'but Marilyn says parents are evil, so we just said anything.'

In their ignorance, the children had summoned the black and white cartoon of Steam Boat Willy. 'It was rubbish,' says one boy, 'all it did was repeatedly pull at the air as if it was turning the bathroom light on and off, over and over.'

The incident would have gone unnoticed, but as the children quickly lost interest and wandered off, the cartoon

released years of pent up rage and tore itself from the repetitive cycle of aerial tugs to run amok through the

village, eventually holding an assortment of villagers hostage in the youth club hut.

Local police defused the situation by burning the building down with all the people in it. A local officer explained,

'We looked over a list of the folks inside and it was agreed that none of them served any useful purpose to families

or friends. The operation to save them would have been a waste of valuable public resources.

All the children involved learned a valuable lesson about how rock music can lead to an urge to try and change the world using vastly unrealistic methods, and how this often leads to the death of innocents.

It's no secret that the standard of applicants for the Forces has been declining steadily since it first became

apparent that, in recent times, soldiers have a far greater chance of being involved in wars.

With Tony Blair playing lap dog to President Bush, members of the forces as a whole have been discovering

what it's like to nearly be, or actually be, dead.

When attempts to raise the profile of the job using fancy adverts failed, alternative solutions had to be

considered.

In an attempt to re-launch their party, the Conservatives have been outlining future plans for the services should they overturn the current government at the next general election, scheduled for 2010.

The first of these proposals reached the public domain today, as Shadow Ministers and members of the Countryside Alliance gathered to discuss the implications of supporting a permanently airborne air force.

The notion has been developed to combat the need to learn and master the tricky aspects of take-off and landing. The shadow defence minister said, 'By keeping the whole thing in the air, we have a vastly improved response time. Wives and families will live aboard the planes - doing the washing and keeping the plane nice and tidy, ready for war.'

Sceptics have said that this is a bad idea. They have pointed out that fuel costs and pollution will both escalate in the wake of the plan, and that a cockpit is no place to raise a family.