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.”

Better Start Wiping Pensioners’ Bums If You’re Planning On Getting Old Yourself, Suggests Government

Mr Parsons can't wait to introduce you to his runny bottom

The government is studying with interest a plan to blackmail people into looking after the elderly in their free time, it was announced today.

The voluntary scheme would give people the freedom to decide whether to clean shit off the senile on a regular basis for the whole of their working lives, or die of neglect once they retire.

In Japan, where the scheme has been in operation since 1991, volunteers are entitled to ‘bank’ the hours they spend caring for the elderly in the hope that a future government might in some way take care of them in return when they reach old age.

“UK life expectancy is currently 80 years,” said care services minister Paul Burstard. “For most people, that’s going to mean well over 100,000 hours of retirement. Therefore, on a pro rata basis, today’s 18-year-olds should probably plan on spending about 40 hours a week of their spare time hauling dribbling senior citizens in an out of the bath, just to be on the safe side.”

Charities have given a cautious welcome to the general principle of encouraging people to volunteer, but also pointed out that this was “the stupidest fucking nonsense” they’d heard since the repeal of the Poor Laws in 1948.

Banks Urge Government To Reclaim Pensions-Error Money, Give It To Banks

The government is facing calls from the banking sector to claw back £126m in overpayments made to public-sector pensioners since 1978. Although it is to amend future payments, the government has said it had no plans to reclaim money already paid out - estimated to average £1300 per pensioner.

In a joint letter to Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the heads of Britain's leading financial industries said that the money would be much better spent on them instead.

"What are these former pen-pushing civil servants, lefty teachers and time-serving grunts spending this misbegotten cash on?" they asked. "Werther's Originals, subscriptions to Reader's Digest and People's Friend, mountains of cat food and bloody scratchcards, in all probability. What the hell is the good of that? It is only thanks to our sheer brilliance and unstinting hard work that Britain is the country it is today - this money should be going into our pockets, not somebody else's."

Low-paid workers who have been pushed deeper into poverty by the government's relentless pursuit of tax-credit overpayments in the last few years also expressed their outrage that the government was allowing the pensioners to get off scot-free and keep the money.

"Well, perhaps if you'd voted Labour as regularly and uncritically as your elderly relatives, we might give a shit," said a Treasury spokesman.

Britain Hopes to Lead World in Geriatric Swimming

The government has announced plans to scrap swimming-pool admission charges in England for the over-60s.

Unveiling the plan, Culture, Media and Sport Secretary Andy Burnham said the intention was to encourage more people to take up sport in the run-up to the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

“In international geriatric swimming, Britain’s pensioners can hold their heads up,” said Mr Burnham. “They have to, or the water ruins their perms and washes the dye out.”

The government hopes to extend the £80m scheme to the whole population. However, swimmers around the country remained sceptical.

“All the local authority pools round here have long since been flogged off to developers and torn down,” said one veteran in a fetching blue rubber cap. “Our only real chance of getting a swim is whenever the streets flood because the council doesn’t like spending anything on unblocking the drains.”