Wednesday 27 June 2012

Queen prepares for historic handshake

The Queen is in Belfast today where, in an historic symbol of accord and reconciliation, she is to shake the hand of Deputy First Minister and former chief of staff of the IRA Martin McGuinness.

The handshake between the two has been variously described as "historic", "hugely significant", descriptive of "a life beyond conflict" and "just a fucking handshake".

We asked two-time major golf championship winner and handshake enthusiast Greg Norman for an insider's analysis of how the handshake will go. "It's important Her Majesty gets the stance right", the Australian right-hander told us, "as all the power is generated through a solid base. Get that wrong and you may end up with a limp effort that ends up doing more damage to a delicate situation as it could be interpreted as an insult."

The Shark went on to describe atmospheric conditions that could hinder a successful conclusion to the handshake. "She has to take account of the wind, make sure she good palm-to-palm contact. I remember the 1993 Open championship and closing out my round with Berhard Langer. A sudden gust from the north-east almost blew my hand out of the way like I was doing that childhood prank of pulling it away at the last minute. That almost caused a diplomatic incident, but like the pro he is, Bernhard read it and adjusted at the last moment to complete a successful shake".

The handshake is thought to be a standard three pumps and release, no clasping of second hand over the top and any move by McGuinness to give it the bear hug on the back of it is likely to prompt a swift and decisive response from the security services. "The best plan for McGuinness", Norman ended by telling us, "is to take his lead from the Queen on this first one. If they decide to go for it again, then maybe some extra affectation may be possible. I'd stay away from the fist-bump though. The Queen hates that".

Thursday 21 June 2012

Greek depression further delays Parthenon completion

The deep financial depression in Greece has seen the date of completion of the Parthenon in Athens put back even further.

Construction of the temple to the goddess Athena was started in 447BC, but today it's still half-built and there is little evidence of recent construction activity on the site. Chief architect Kallikrates told News Arse about the difficulties facing the Greek construction industry. "Our contractors went bust approximately 2470 years ago and many more have gone to the wall since. Inflation is all over the place, so contractors can't price jobs with any accuracy, so we find it difficult to get a commitment to a long term project like this as the price a year - a month - from today could be wildly different. I mean, a couple of frescos when we started this project was a few hundred talents - now, many millions of euros".

"With prices rising and wages under pressure to stay down" Kallikrates continued, "it's also hard to find labour and retain it. Skilled labour the sort of which we need to finish the marbles that will be pinched for some other country's museums is also hard to find given the cost pressures that are on the job".

Despite all the issues facing the Parthenon project, it's still expected to be cheaper and less late than the rebuilt Wembley stadium in London.

Wednesday 13 June 2012

Big liar lies about lying to parliament

A big fat liar who tells lots of lies today defended himself from accusation that he lied to parliament by lying.

Jeremy Pinocchio, the culture secretary, came up with the outrageous lie "I did not lie" during a debate instigated by Labour that calls for an investigation into whether Pinocchio broke the ministerial code over contacts made to News Corp by his special adviser Jiminy Smith.

Accused by the opposition of having pants which were "on fire", Pinocchio countered that while they were definitely warm, smoking a bit and had what appeared to be flames coming out of them, he hadn't deliberately set them on fire and that was all alright then. In closing and responding to questions about his advisers, Pinocchio told the house that "Jiminy Smith is a man of great integrity and that's why he had to resign".

In an unrelated matter, Pinocchio had earlier told the house that the Olympics were scheduled to come in almost half a billion pounds under budget. "This is fantastic news" said Pinocchio, "despite the fact that the total spent is four times what the initial bid said we'd spend". He claimed this showed that Britain can deliver big projects on time and to budget. "It's something we can be proud of, just like Wembley, the Milennium Dome, all our military procurement and Crossrail. All delivered to time and budget".

Pinocchio's nose is 42".

Friday 1 June 2012

U-turns help government in 'greenest ever' pledge

When the UK government was formed in 2010, the coalition agreement contained the claim that it was going to be "the greenest government ever". These pledges have fallen by the wayside as a concentration on economic and fiscal policy and making sure the proles are as miserable as possible has overridden any other concern. But new figures released by the department for energy and climate change (DECC) show that is now being reversed and the UK is on target to meet it's emissions requirements.

"By wiring government into the National Grid", said Sir Bernard Lightson, chief civil servant to DECC, "we've been able to use the power generated by the constant u-turns to increase our renewables capacity by 20%. This has knock-on effects in reducing our reliance on supply of oil and gas from overseas with resultant budget savings and increasing the security and reliability of supply".

Criticism has been raised that, like wind, u-turn power is intermittent and cannot be relied on to supply demand when most needed. Sir Lightson responded, saying "we believe there is an inexhaustible supply of power to be gained from this source, and with fixed terms introduced, there'll be plenty of u-turns to generate electricity from until at least 2015."