Snap election prank provokes parliamentary pandemonium

The government was in turmoil last week after a malicious prankster wangled his way into Buckingham Palace and persuaded the Queen to announce the dissolution of Parliament more than a year before it was due. Suddenly, with only forty-eight hours for any outstanding business to get onto the statute book before the Thursday deadline, no less than twenty-seven government Bills were facing the chop. A chaotic frenzy of bartering and horse-trading broke out among ministers desperate for at least a few watered-down clauses of their own department's legislation to get through.

"It's a nightmare," admitted the hard-pressed Leader of the House Peter La Haine. "After eight years we were almost there — the orderly progess of all of these crucial Bills through Parliament was carefully mapped out. They'd have made it into law by the summer, bringing noticeable improvements in vital populist areas such as homeland security, crime, law and order and immigration and boosting our ratings dramatically in time for the election, when suddenly the rug's been pulled out from under our feet. There'll be hell to pay when I get my hands on the bastard who did this!"

Hardest hit by the constitutional outrage was Home Secretary Charles Clarke, whose carefully constructed raft of thirteen liberty-busting Bills now looks destined never to float. He rounded on prime suspect Michael Howard at the despatch box on Wednesday, hinting in no uncertain terms that the unscrupulous Tory leader had both the motive and the means to have committed the brazen offence.

Well prepared for the expected accusation, Mr Howard retorted in fine style: "I'm sorry to disappoint the Home Secretary but it simply wasn't me. At the time of the incident at the Palace on Tuesday Mrs Howard and I were attending a wife-swapping in Tunbridge Wells, where incidentally I spent a thoroughly rewarding few hours strenuously encouraging the white women of Britain to have more babies."

Mr Clarke was visibly deflated. The credibility, and indeed laudability, of his opponent's alibi could not be disputed. He looked around for another target and caught sight of Charles Kennedy perched uncomfortably in the Liberal corner, red-faced as usual, looking guilty as sin. The Home Secretary's eyes narrowed over the top of his spectacles, fixing the quaking Liberal Democrat leader with an icy stare. "Was it you?" he demanded.

For the life of him Kennedy couldn't remember. After staggering out of an empty reception hall in the early hours of Sunday morning clutching a glass in one hand and a last bottle of the excellent port in the other it was all a blur, up until the moment he'd been roused out of bed and bundled into a taxi barely an hour ago. It was left to the distinguished Liberal Democrat spokesman on foreign affairs Sir Menzies Campbell to take the floor on his leader's behalf. "Shame! Shame!" he lashed out at the overbearing Home Secretary in turn. "The very idea! I suggest you look a bit closer to home for your culprit."

Judging it was unwise to pursue the matter further, Mr Clarke contented himself with a strong warning to the House. "Make no mistake, when I catch the mindless, irresponsible, blithering idiot who's bamboozled Her Majesty and brought the proceedings of this House into disrepute, I'll have his guts for garters!" he fumed. Empurpled with frustrated rage he stepped back and planted his ample hindquarters on the bench beside the Prime Minister, whose head was bent low as he appeared to intensively scrutinise some highly important official documents in his lap.

Minister after minister stepped forward to bemoan the sad fate of their own flagship legislation. "Make nae mistake," announced Dr John Reid, in an echo of his Cabinet colleague's words, "when I get a hold o' the fuc*kin' bastard who did this I'll kick his friggin' head in." And there were few in the House who did not commiserate with the Health Secretary over the unfortunate axeing of his own Bill. As a result, the country now has another long, anxious wait in store for measures to be introduced that will once and for all stop immigrants claiming free health care on the NHS until they can prove they've washed their hands properly after cleaning the bedpans.

Since the dissolution of Parliament on Thursday the speculation as to the identity of the wanton saboteur has reached fever pitch. Downing Street issued a terse statement that the Prime Minister was "incandescent with fury" that his personal prerogative to decide on the timing of the election had been usurped. Mr Blair himself was unavailable for comment. Following strategic advice by party activists to keep his head down until after polling day, he was enjoying a well-earned three weeks' holiday at an undisclosed safe resort somewhere "on the coast".

As regular readers of The Rockall Times will know, its fleet-footed correspondents have an uncanny knack of being in the right place at the right time far more often than their more gauche and lumbering rivals, and the Sunday evening just gone was no exception. Acting on a hunch, I'd hardly booked into the premier five-star hotel at the high security former fishing village of St Alwell, playground of the political élite, than I spotted a familiar-looking high-powered entourage, not especially boisterous, but displaying a kind of muscular swagger as it made its way with grim determination from bar to billiard room. I adroitly latched onto the testosterone-fuelled party and after a few closely contested frames with the likes of former communications director Alastair Campbell and current campaign strategist Alan Milburn, had gained enough confidence to ask the odd probing question of the Prime Minister himself.

It was obvious he was bursting to spill the beans. "Yes, all right, I admit it, it was me," he candidly confessed in the euphoria of potting the red that I'd craftily left hanging over the pocket.

"But why?" I asked in bemusement. "Why now? Your poll rating has slumped, your personal credibility is still bumping along the bottom and now you've got the three toughest Cabinet bruisers queuing up to beat the living daylights out of you if they ever find out."

"Look," Tony replied, in his most disarming conspiratorial tone. "I can perfectly understand that some people will take a different view, but that's because they're thick. When you look at all the evidence there's no escaping the conclusion that I simply had to call the election for May the fifth this year."

"But what evidence is that?" I eagerly asked.

"Quite simply, that I know it's the right thing to do," he pronounced with a blazing gleam in his eye. Campbell and Milburn, who'd interrupted their game to listen in, nodded approvingly.

"And that perfect knowledge," he continued, "brings with it responsibility. When you know it's the right thing to do you can't just sit by and not act."

Now it was yours truly who couldn't wait to get out of the room to spill the beans. This was dynamite. The last time Mr Blair knew for an absolute fact that something was the right thing to do was in March 2003, just before taking the British people with him on a magnificent rollercoaster ride that will be the stuff of legends for generations to come. Was something similar in store for the coming weeks of the campaign?

But I couldn't leave just yet. No journalist would ever have a better opportunity than this to pop the vital question. Did I dare? The cue trembled in my excited grip.

"Tony, um... when you know it's absolutely the right thing to do, I mean... do you... is it because there's someone... bigger than Alastair even, who you bounce the idea off to make sure?"

The game of angles and strategy played out on the green baize was forgotten. Tony was transfixed by my questioning. I thought I caught an imperceptible nod.

"Is it," I continued, "almost as if they... God perhaps... is telling you it's the right thing to do?"

Tony opened his mouth to speak, but suddenly Campbell was in the way, forcing me back with an aggressively angled cue.

"Like fuc*k it is!" the smooth-talking public relations guru interjected on the Prime Minister's behalf. "No fuc*king way!" he elaborated. "And mind your fuc*king language. We don't use the G word here!"

The atmosphere in the room had turned sour. Milburn and half a dozen heavies crowded around, barring my way out. I looked for the Prime Minister but he was gone, spirited away by his minders from a potentially ugly scene. Milburn, clueless as usual, waited for Campbell to give the nod. I tensed. They could knock me about, but they couldn't stop me telling the world what I knew, unless...

Next week

Thrills and spills a-plenty. Beans and blood decorate the tracks on Tony Blair's rollercoaster ride into the heroic third term.

Previously

• Un-pukka nosh rumpus rumbles on
• Government signposts chilling mind-control programme
• Lib Dems wipe down their stain-resistant manifesto