Queen’s Speech Causes Uproar

The Queen caused a serious breach of protocol today by cracking up in the middle of delivering her speech, during the State Opening of Parliament for five minutes before it closes again for the Christmas recess.

Her Majesty had been visibly struggling to keep a straight face during the reading of the proposed ‘Get A Job - Win A House!’ Bill. Next, as she made an heroic effort to deliver the line, ‘My government's overwhelming priority is to secure the stability of the British economy', she tittered for a few seconds before bursting into a fit of uncontrolled laughter. Members of Parliament and peers of the realm shuffled about in embarrassment as the monarch slid from her golden throne to the red carpet, with tears in her eyes.

Having glowered furiously through five minutes of sobbing laughter, Prime Minister Gordon Brown strode forward, hauled the helpless Queen to her feet and frogmarched her from the chamber. Before flummoxed royal footmen could intervene, the PM threw her unceremoniously into the corridor and slammed the door.

After several minutes of guffawing heartily and gasping for breath, the still-giggling Queen was picked up off the floor by flunkies, pushed into the royal carriage and driven off to Buckingham Palace, leaving a little puddle behind on the carpet.

Meanwhile, Parliament had descended into uproar, with the cabinet and many Labour MPs demanding an apology from the palace for what they called ‘a shocking display of contempt for the authority of parliamentary authority’, while senior Tories were calling for the Prime Minister to be summarily executed for laying hands on the reigning monarch. Constitutional experts say that the only precedent for such uproar is the dissolution of Parliament, to be followed by a period of intense civil strife.

The police are reported to be uneasy, saying that some of them have not yet been issued with 10,000-volt Tasers. Meanwhile, the armed forces have yet to declare for the monarch or parliament - although many of the troops in Afghanistan and Iraq were said to be looking forward to coming back to Britain early, and drawing lots to see who could have the honour of tying the Prime Minister to a post and shooting him with a chain gun.