A Roundabout Postscript
By WIIITEHORN and RAY 1. All public telephones, whether for local or long-distance calls, shall give warning pips at three minutes, and cut off completely at four. It shall be an• offence (cf. parking meters) for any one person to insert coins for a second call immediately following the first. In Order not to interfere with the transmission of press messages, members of the National Union of Journalists (bat Nor of the Institute of Journalists) shall be allotted a.code s aid or, number w hich, on being communicated to the operator, shall ensure an unbroken use 'of the telephone, provided always that the call is not to a private number but to a newspaper office.
2. Any person or group of persons owning or leasing a building for religious purposes shall be required to furnish evidence that the average attendance is at least 60 per cent. of the seating capacity (the capacity 10 be judged on floor area and not on the number of chairs provided). Any such group which for three consecutive years fails to furnish such evidence shall be compelled to sell, lease or donate the building to any other group which can satisfy the local authority that it can keep the building filled, the lessees or vendors being then under the same obligation as the original occupiers of the building. In any com- munity where no group can be found to fill the buildings, and no combination of merger between different denominations can be arranged, it may, at the discretion of the local authority, be com- pulsorily purchased or pulled down.
3. The annual licence fee for dogs shall be increased forthwith from 7s. 6d. to £500. There shall be exemption from the payment of any licence fee for the owner of working dogs (e.g., guide dogs for the blind, sheepdogs, etc.) as at present; and also for men and women over sixty living alone.
(a) The expression 'working • dogs' shall not include foxhounds, otterhounds, stag- hounds, basset hounds or beagles, or any dogs used in • the pursuit of game or
vermin for plea- sure.
(b) The holder of a dog licence, on a second conviction for permitting his animal to foul any • footpath or public place or vehicle, shall be condem- ned to eat the • offending excre- ment, in the pre- sence of not. more than six or fewer than three such
persons as may at present recommend application for a passport.
4. The law relating to taxation shall' be amended so that only those luncheons can be claimed as legitimate business expenses for which the bills are submitted in an approved form. This form, to be completed when the bill is paid for at the termination of the meal, must state the name, age, profession and firm of both entertainer and entertained, as well as a statement of what business advantage may be hoped to accrue from the meal. These forms will be available only in approved and liceriSed restaurants, such restaur- ants to carry in letters of headline size, clearly visible both•inilde' and outside the establishment, the ttnnouncement that the proprietor is licensed to sell food and drink for business purposes.
5. Each year, -in the registration of electors, persons entitled to be 'so registered in completing the customary form shall indicate, by a simple 'for' or 'against,' without comment or reserva- tion, whether he or she is in-favour of or opposed to the retention of capital punishment. On the Electoral list, those indicating 'for' shall be so marked (cf. the Jury Service regulation) and fifty such persons shall be selected by ballot to wit- ness judicial hanging, whenever such executions take place. When the 'againsts' on the electoral roll outnumber the 'fors' capital punishment shall be abolished forthwith.
6. Actors and actresses working for the cinema shall be required to play their roles in low, with- out the aid of stunt men, doubles, etc. Thus in any film where a human being swings across chasms on vines, is fired from a gun, rescued from a torrent, dropped off a cliff,'rolled in the mud, etc., the named actor shall himself be re- quired to roll in the mud, fall from the cliff, etc., provided always that such an action would be performed by a human being, not a stuffed dummy, It is expected that the effect of this Bill will be either to produce a new breed of film actors who are actually as tough as the characters they play; or, upon the refusal of actors to attempt the feats of daring assigned to them, the ideal of violent action may be altered. This shall apply equally to Ty films and imported films, even, and indeed especially, when enforcement of the Act would have the effect of excluding many imported films altogether.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we solicit your votes.
Previous page
