Mad Dogs And Englishmen

In the Benefit Basher Bill currently going through the motions in Parliament few people have noticed that in Schedule 632, page 3241, related to Clause 527 Section 764, Sub Section 87 of the main bill there is a wording that allows the government to call on anyone receiving any benefit, including old age pensions, to be asked to contribute to society in any way they have done so at any time before.

What is not realised that amongst other things this means that anyone who has served in the military in the past and has any money coming from government is now recalled as part of a permanent reserve and can be mobilised as and when required.

In a way it is a return to the days when the Militia formed an important part of our security and policing services together with groups such as the Fencibles and the Yeomanry. 

This, the government feels, is an expression of the idea of the Big Society and enables community devolvement in a way that reinstates British tradition.

The crime reporter of the Wapping Chronicle (formerly The Sun), Dandy Burdoch, has been in touch with Mad Dog Demetrius who lives in social housing in Cheltenham for his response to this. 

Mad Dog did two years National Service between 1952 and 1978, taking longer than most because of periods for respite and counselling at various secure military establishments.

Having gone straight from the Army into early retirement Mad Dog has recently become an environmental and community activist whose web site “Hanging Is Not Good Enough” attracts a wide readership.  The poll on who should be burned at the stake each week is widely reported.

Locally, Mad Dog hopes to take advantage of the new legislation to set up a network of machine gun emplacements to cover the pathways between the crack houses and substance retailers on his estate.  He hopes this could become a model for others. 

In addition he is demanding that the many cannabis farms in his area in homes, sheds and some industrial estates should be classified as businesses and therefore liable to local and national taxes.  Their present classification as agricultural with EU subsidies he feels is wrong.

Unluckily, his naming of the local councillors who have invested heavily in these trades has led to threats of legal action and worse from the Cheltenham Cosa Nostra, a private limited liability company that does not submit accounts and does not need to undertake compliance because of current Company House facilities.

Mad Dog intends to found a local community regiment from ex-servicemen in the style of the old landowners of the past who created so many of the Army’s previous and now lost regiments of the Horse and Line. 

If the new legislation allows people to forgo their benefits in return for service in an organisation which will reward itself from local activity, it will mean real community initiative will replace government agencies.

When asked about how such groups might enforce their vision of the future, he thinks there will be no real problem because there is a lot of experience to draw on. 

But there are real concerns that the impact on the night time economies of many towns may be detrimental to the GDP figures and inward foreign capital flows into the UK which at present depend on the continuing rapid expansion of gambling, drink and sex services.

When asked about how such an organisation might deal with hard line bodies active in this field, such as the Bullingdon Club in Oxford Mad Dog made it clear that he felt they were all chick pea and mange tout.

The community militia would take their pants off and throw them over the parapet of Magdalen Bridge into the River Cherwell before you could say Edward Miliband.

A spokesperson for the Home Office, when asked about Mad Dog’s suggestions said that guidance would be needed on Human Rights issues.