The Agreeable World Of Wallace Arnold: Save the British bulldog from being cut off in its prime

We're on the move!!! Yes, it's been a tremendous week for those of us who have no wish to be ridden over roughshod by the bureaucrats of Brussels and their Westminster henchmen. But let us not rest on our laurels. Looking at these latest statistics from the EEC, it is clear to me that the battle is far from over.

A forthcoming Eurodiktat sponsored by the Germans is to see to the forcible castration of the Great British Bulldog. Any bulldog spotted on the streets by a highly trained team of Euro-sponsored dog watchers will be instantly hit with a blow pipe, locked in a cage three sizes too small, and forcibly castrated to bring it into line with EEC directives. A raid by Euro-trained customs officers on a warehouse near Hemel Hempstead has already uncovered a large cache of spaniel masks, ready for immediate use by British bulldogs wishing to avoid clinical castration.

From 1 July 1999, all British owners of donkeys will be forced to starve them to within inches of death. Following intervention from the Spanish, there will be fines given to all those who feed their donkeys more than two (2) biscuits a day. By law, donkeys must also be taunted by British owners up to three (3) times a week. During a specially enforced fiesta, scheduled to coincide with Ascot, all British donkeys will be paraded up and down the Mall, there to be subjected to taunts and insults from visiting citizens from EEC member states. The Queen Mother, HM the Queen and Prince Philip will all ride on the same 18-year-old donkey along the Mall to Admiralty House, where it will collapse beneath them and die. This operation will be overseen by the Greeks.

When a new EEC directive goes ahead, "gobbing" on the streets will be compulsory by the year 2005. It is already compulsory in the European Parliament, where up to 250 gallons of Euro-saliva are gathered up by cleaners each day, later to be reprocessed and recycled in bottles clearly labelled "Natural Mineral Water: Product of More Than One Country". During her visit to Austria later this year, HM the Queen will be expected to gob in a formal manner when greeting the Chancellor. She is at present taking lessons in gobbing from highly skilled operatives. By 2003, in accordance with EEC articles of practice, British offices and shops will ban all non-gobbers from their premises, and penalties for failing to gob in the street are expected to reach four figures.

Draconian Euro-directives soon to be unveiled will call for Gesticulation to take its place in the British classroom alongside Mathematics, Science, Tax Avoidance and Euro-Literature. By the age of eight, the British child will be expected to have a working knowledge of the meaning of everyday Euro-gesticulations such as "May a balcony fall on top of your mother, crushing her new hat" and "May your saliva run dry in the run-up to the annual Seville Gobbing Festival".

There are threats ahead, too, for such traditional British pastimes as cricket. In future, draft Euro-diktats rule that the place of the second (2nd) batsman must be taken by a rabid dog. And only last week in Manchester, an elderly lady, grandmother of four and respected pillar of the community, privately educated and owner of a luxury home valued at more than pounds 200,000, was threatened with a hefty EEC fine - simply for threatening a Brussels- trained Health and Safety apparatchik with a chain-saw! The officer had been attempting to ride roughshod over 400 years of British history by stopping the senior citizen from placing the traditional dead vole in her Lancashire Hotpot.

Other Great British Foods under threat from the EEC include our national dish of Bangers and Mash. In future, the Great British Banger will have to contain more than five per cent meat. This will undoubtedly threaten the livelihood of local manufacturers of tyres, condoms, mothballs, adhesives and string, all of whom are at present key suppliers to the British sausage industry. The Mash, too, may be affected: an EEC commission has decided that in future the traditional "magic ingredient" of up to three per cent phlegm will no longer be permitted, other than in cases of emergency.

Finally, news has just come in that the Great British Pub will no longer be able to continue serving gravy with chicken-in-the-basket. Jobs have already been axed at a well-known Yorkshire manufacturers of galoshes and protective footwear, and further job losses are expected.

So young Hague still has an uphill struggle on his hands. But the signs are encouraging. Blair is running scared and with poor old Lilley being shown the door marked "Exit", the sky's the limit. Mind your backs, British Bulldogs - we're on our way.