New Planning Guidelines All Things To Everyone, Beams Pickles

Mr Pickles says everyone's behind him, which is believable

Property developers, tree-huggers, NIMBYs, farmers, bankers, decent working families, Labour, young people, the disabled, the security forces, terrorists, penguins, seals, whales, plankton, generations as yet unborn and John Carter of Mars should unite in praising the government’s new one-page guide to planning, communities secretary Eric Pickles declared today.

“Replacing 1300 pages of really tedious crap that was only of interest to nerdy planners and other interfering busybodies with a simple tick-box ready reckoner is the only way to safeguard the beautiful vistas of England’s grey and pleasant land, both now and for future generations to come,” he insisted with a big shit-eating grin.

Those Planning Guidelines In Full

1. Will the developer trouser a tidy sum from this proposal?
Yes - APPROVED
Of course not, I’m only doing it for the good of my health – go to QUESTION 2
2. Are local (herein defined as <10m) residents likely to suffer significant loss of amenity, health or life?
No - APPROVED
Only poor people – go to QUESTION 3
3. Is the developer prepared to offer a token Section 106 bung to the council in used fivers, thereby keeping a library in another ward from closure for another day?
Yes – APPROVED
There aren’t any libraries left – go to QUESTION 4
4. Is the development in a Tory marginal ward?
Yes – REFUSED
No - APPROVED

Osborne Keen To Borrow Your Pension To Build A Tunnel To Romania, If That’s All Right

They are coming

The government would quite like to borrow your pension - just for a century or two - in order to employ an army of Poles to build a massive trans-European toll tunnel to Bucharest, ready for the day when the government finally bows to the inevitable and lets all the Romanians and Bulgarians in to snap up any remaining jobs, announced chancellor George Osborne this morning.

“Look, we can’t keep stalling these buggers forever,” he grinned cheerfully. “They’ll be here eventually, whether we like it or not. At least, this way, we can charge them a few bob for the privilege of not having to speak to the French.”

“After all, it’s not like you’re actually likely to be needing your pensions,” he reasoned smoothly. “By the time we’ve finished with the NHS, your life expectancy is going to be about 40.”

English And Scottish Athletes Set Out On Busman’s Holiday

English and Scottish athletes are flying out to Delhi today to compete in the troubled Commonwealth Games, after thanking their national sporting bodies for showing such concern for their welfare but pointing out that, being British, they were already accustomed to living in a squalid, substandard environment where nothing works properly.

“Ah’m frae Pennybrook, see?” explained Glasgow’s improvised javelin-throwing hope, Wee Billy Bampot. “So yon athlete’s village looks bonny tae me.”

“Ah was afraid ah wis goin’ tae put sae mich effort intae trashin’ the place ah’d be too knackered tae compete,” pointed out Mad Jimmy McTavish, Scotland’s leading head-butter. “Bit ah see ah woan’ haftae alter a thing. It’s a fair haem fra’ haem.”

As fresh research confirmed the UK as the worst place to live in the whole of Europe, competitors from south of the border echoed their Scots counterparts’ enthusiasm.

“Delhi’s faculties, yeah, is ver shoddy like produck uv plit’co crupshun, theevin’ propty developers, unskilled layba an’ like rusty bricks innit jenotameen?” said English 100m projectile-vomiting champion Sammi-Jo Bloggs. “Well I’m from Hackney yeah where vee Olympics is gonna be innit. Standud.”

Hackney's sporting facilities provide excellent training for Delhi

Dismissing safety fears raised by the murder of two tourists recently, she added: “Juno me mate Vikram yeah, ee’s got a cousin right wot knows sam bloke wot’s got faimly aht ver wot knows this geeza wot kin sawt me aht wiv a shoota innit, a proppa wan right yeah I fink iss a Oozy akshly, no questions arst jenotameen? Sawtid. Sah bring it on.”

Britain Sinks

In a tragedy without parallel in the annals of civilisation - if you discount an old Greek fairy story - the British Isles slipped forever under the waves of the Atlantic this morning.

The only survivors to have escaped with their lives appear to have been directors of Britain's corporate property developers and privatised water companies, who realised the reckoning had finally arrived after years of building on flood plains and underinvestment in drainage.

"We've been watching the rainfall charts for years, waiting for the inevitable to happen," said one executive, ruefully pouring muddy water from his shoe. "Even so, the speed with which the UK's overloaded drainage systems finally gave up the ghost almost took us by surprise. We only just managed to get to our yachts and helicopters in time."

The last of the UK's hapless 61m residents to succumb to a watery grave were council chiefs - who were last heard of holding emergency meetings to discuss possible increases in budget allocations for unblocking drains, in the final moments before the shining battlements of their ivory towers sank beneath the rising flood waters.

Worldwide reaction to the disappearance of Great Britain has been mixed. Spaniards are said to be highly amused at the prospect of hundreds of thousands of right-wing ex-pats having to apply for refugee status as stateless persons, while beach resorts all over the world are looking forward to being able to reduce their policing budgets thanks to a huge reduction in alcohol-fuelled public disorder.

Meanwhile, the US Army has kindly offered to hire the UK's forces in Afghanistan as mercenaries, in a continuation of its existing policy.

The Netherlands government is less delighted, however, as the Atlantic swell begins to overflow the dykes on its seaboard, eating away at Holland at an estimated rate of seven kilometres a day.

"Shit, man, there goes our breakwater," said Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, as he paddled into a press conference.