Here, in the spirit of fun - and with apologies for bad taste and to the man himself - LEO McKINSTRY imagines Clarkson's manifesto.
1 ENCOURAGE GLOBAL WARMING
Britons will be encouraged, through discounts and tax relief, to drive 4x4s, Jaguars and BMWs. Not only will this give a valuable boost to our oil industry, but it will encourage climate change. And what's not to like about global warming? Holland gets flooded and we get California's weather. That's what I call a win/win situation.
2 ABOLISH CRICKET
How can we take seriously a sport that stops for afternoon tea and whose followers wear striped blazers and bray like horses? Let's face it, we have been rubbish at cricket for years, so we should put an end to the endless cycle of misery in summer. My Government will bring back proper sports, such as jousting and bear-baiting.
3 END THE SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP
The only thing special about our link with the U.S. is the amount of grovelling we do. My Government will stop acting as if Britain is the 51st state of the union. The last time I went across the Atlantic, I found people so stupid I'm convinced their nearest living relative must be a gherkin. They're the sort of people who can't read a road sign without moving their lips. Plus their cars are about as sexy as Ann Widdecombe's armpit.
4 BAN HEALTH & SAFETY
The safety bureaucrats are the abominable no-men, constantly dreaming up new reasons to abolish fun and hobble business. With their silly regulations, they have done more damage to British industry than the Luftwaffe. They are the human equivalent of a Lada. But at least you could drive a Lada off a cliff.
5 DEAL WITH YOUTH CRIME
It's true that some juvenile oiks come from broken homes where parents have all the child-rearing skills of King Herod. But let's stop making excuses. These delinquents have been creating mayhem for too long. They need to be taught some fear. Looking down the barrel of a sub-machine gun in a prison camp on the Outer Hebrides might do the trick.
6 REMOVE SPEED CAMERAS
Thanks to mass immigration, urban traffic moves at the speed of an arthritic snail. But still motorists are bullied by the rash of speed cameras, which are nothing more than a revenue-raising device. Serious criminals do not have to put up with this level of surveillance. My Government will tear down cameras and raise the motorway speed limit to 150mph.
7 TEACH BRITISH HISTORY
Pupils are taught to feel ashamed of their past, our national flag is treated as an embarrassment, our heritage as a source of shame. My Government would end this cultural cringe. The only problem with the Empire is that it wasn't big enough and didn't last long enough.
8 GET OUT OF IRAQ
Our involvement in Iraq has been the most misguided foreign adventure since Napoleon said: "I hear Moscow's nice at this time of year." As Prime Minister, I will bring back every British soldier and let the Iraqis get on with the national pastime of killing each other. And I'll put His Tonyness on trial for crimes against humanity and the Armed Services.
9 BRING BACK THE STOCKS
Despite Big Brother, there isn't enough humiliation in public life for those who deserve it. The medieval authorities had the right idea. The Beckhams will be the first in the stocks, followed by the chairman of the Health & Safety Executive.
10 END RECYCLING HELL
Putting out the rubbish used to be a simple task. Thanks to the tyrants of green officialdom, it has been turned into a nightmare. Placing the wrong garbage in the wrong bin is regarded as worse than mugging a granny. My Government will restore sanity by providing everyone with a bin the size of Bernard Manning, which will be emptied twice a week.
11 BANISHWALES
In my new-look Britain, Wales will be forced to go independent. Any country that has produced Neil Kinnock, Max Boyce and Charlotte Church does not deserve to remain in the UK.
12 AND EAST ANGLIA
That boring lump of flatness stretching out into the North Sea will have no place in Clarkson's Britain either. Then all those tiresome luvvies with second homes in Norfolk and Suffolk can have the thrill of going to a foreign country without flying to Tuscany.
13 BAN DIESEL CARS
A diesel has all the excitement of a vegan dinner party. It might be good for you, but so is cod liver oil. The same goes for lowemission cars such as the Toyota Prius. Feeling self-righteous as you tootle around at 10mph may earn you Brownie points with the knit-your-own-lentil brigade, but to the rest of the world, you look like a sanctimonious idiot.
14 END HUMAN RIGHTS
Under my Government, the rights of ordinary British citizens will have a higher priority than those of Islamic terrorists, Somalian gang-leaders and knife-wielding thugs. Homosexual pornography for deranged serial killers will not be regarded as a human right, nor will multi-million pound fees for hypocritical Leftwing lawyers milking the system.
15 KICK OUT BUREAUCRATS
The former U.S. President Ronald Reagan once said that the state was like a baby's alimentary canal: endless appetite at one end and utter irresponsibility at the other. My Government will reduce taxes by cracking down on all pen-sucking, paper-pushing jobsworths, outreach counsellors and parking enforcers, equality officers and drugs co-ordinators. Those who resist will be fed very, very slowly into their own office shredders.
16 FREEDOM TO SMOKE
In my Britain, smoking will no longer be seen as a crime against humanity. In fact, cigarettes will be encouraged in order to reduce the burden on the NHS and state pensions. After all, smokers perform a valuable public services by paying extortionate taxation, then generally failing to reach old age. The Marlboro Man has done more for our economy than any Chancellor.
17 BRITISH INDEPENDENCE
We fought the last war for our independence, and now we're under the heel of the unelected eurocrats of Brussels. Under my rule, Britain will withdraw from the EU, so we will no longer be governed by a bunch of sausage-eating Germans, French cheese-eating surrender monkeys and kebab-swallowing Greeks.
18 NO MORE COOL BRITANNIA
Cool is just a fancy word for pretentious or unpopular. The Clarkson Downing Street will not be interested in appearing "cool". Instead, my team will be encouraged to listen to Seventies rock music and wear figure-hugging blue jeans, no matter what their age.
19 CRACKDOWN ON CYCLISTS
Cycling is just as dreary as recycling and twice as pointless. My Government will come down heavily on this sanctimonious activity by introducing new taxes on Lycra, plastic helmets and the bicycles themselves. Altogether now: "Four wheels good, two wheels bad."
20 PUBLIC EXECUTIONS
Only those without any romantic sense of the richness of British history could pretend not to miss the public hangings at Newgate. The restoration of judicial killings before a cheering crowd would not only bring back some muchneeded colour to British life, but would also give the doomed prisoner the satisfaction of a brief burst of celebrity.
MY CABINET
CHANCELLOR: Ken Dodd - very sound on taxation.
MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Richard Hammond - a man with the right sense of priorities when it comes to modes of travel.
HOME SECRETARY: Henry Cooper - a knockout for criminals.
CABINET SECRETARY: Heidi Klum - no Cabinet meeting would ever be boring with the presence of the supermodel.
MINISTER FOR FOOD & DRINK: Keith Floyd - no more puritan lectures about alcohol units.
FOREIGN SECRETARY: Boris Johnson - diplomacy is his middle name.
Here is the link if you want to sign the petition: http://www.petitiononline.com/JC4PM/petition.html
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