UK government set to ban cars in public

TEN DOWNING STREET today acknowledged the inevitability of global warming and at the same time demonstrated its impotence to do anything about the matter but to stick its finger in a dyke, like the little Dutch kid did in Holland, according to legend.

The UK government rolled out our "environment minister" Elliot Morley [who he? Ed.] to say that rather than ban cars - probably the chief cause of global warming, our country will spend £100 million on flood defences and reduce carbon emissions by more than half by 2050.

The UK has already ratified the Kyoto agreement. But the last time we were in Kyoto that looked pretty polluted too.

Meanwhile, the UK government is making threatening noises about banning the smoking of cigarettes in public places, including bars, almost definitely a finger pointing at the moon suggesting that eventually the internal combustion engine will be banned, too.

People may be able to indulge in driving cars in their back gardens or in specially designed "driving rooms".

Petrol prices in the UK are not cheap, and nor are cigarettes. But analysts estimate that one car using petrol probably generates more smoke when an engine is turned on than a thousand people smoking 10 cigarettes in one British pub on an average night in an average week.

The cost to an individual's health of this pernicious habit is immeasurable. But it will be harder for car owners in Britain to knock this habit on the head than to give up fags. µ

L'INQ
Nosmo King, 10 Drowning Street