The week in tatters

This week's Britain's Got Talent produced some of the oddest sentences I have ever heard on television. "Anyone prepared to die on my show gets 10 out of 10", "We were told to wear less clothes, so we're wearing less clothes" and "Ladies and gentlemen, give a warm welcome to Piers Morgan!" The made-over Susan Boyle appeared on Sunday, blossoming from a dumpy woman into a dumpy woman with dyed hair. Items that Susan has touched are actually being sold on eBay - the whole town of Bathgate has apparently beaten all estimates by going for £23.

An elderly woman in London stored her mother's body in a freezer for up to 20 years. I don't understand why she kept mother in the freezer for 20 years, especially as she'd no longer be edible after two years. She had wanted her mum to have a more dignified resting place, but the binmen refused to take her. The lady said she lost weight through the stress, plus the fact that it can't have made going for a choc ice any easier. At least she got to rest in peas. Asked why she did it, she said she had no choice as the fridge was full.

The World Beard and Moustache Competition took place last weekend, and was won by a woman from my home town of Oxfordshire. The only news that beat this, was a piece featured in the tabloids about a 66-YEAR-OLD woman, who has become the oldest new mum in Britain after giving birth to a baby boy. I'm amazed she needed to have a caesarean section though, you'd think at 66 she would have needed some masking tape down there just to stop it falling out. She says the most important thing is that she is able to give the baby a normal, happy childhood. Which he will have. Right up until she dies. It's going to be unusual having someone in their seventies picking up a child from school who's not a paedophile.

Internet is child's play.

THE curriculum in primary schools is to be revamped so that children are familiar with blogging, podcasts, Wikipedia and Twitter. Aren't kids already familiar with all of those? The average primary school child is already more relaxed with computers than a Nasa scientist. Talk about putting a strain on the teachers, the only people qualified to teach children aged seven about how the internet works are children aged eight.

Another problem with this is that information technology is moving so quickly that, by the time children leave school, computer applications like Twitter will be as dead as the dodo. Although pupils won't have been taught what a dodo is. They'll be saying as dead as Myspace.

A COMPUTER scientist has invented a shoe that can be used as a phone. He says it could mean less people losing their phones. Fair enough but it'll probably mean a lot more people getting dog shit on their ear. There's a guy in my street who's been talking into his shoe for years. How is he supposed to look mental if everyone gets a shoe phone?

Sack MPs and get 600 Mumbai call centre guys to run UK

Well, what do I think about the expense claims?

Gordon Brown welcomed a "Lumley" of Gurkhas into Downing Street. He looked delighted having them there... a pleasant change mixing with a group of people who only want one house each. The Speaker of the House of Commons, Michael Martin, has resigned. He wants to spend more time with his houses. Did you see him try and worm his way out of it? He looked like someone was shovelling sausages down his throat till his was choking on them, and for once, not enjoying it. When the camera zoomed in on his swollen, vodka induced capillary burst face, I seriously thought he was having a stroke, even then the Clarkes surrounding him trying to help him would just be trying to force his pin number from him so they could get the money back he owes, or take claim of his £170,000 pension.

One Lib Dem MP has received death threats over his claims. He is said to be thrilled someone has noticed him at last. Only a handful of MPs have been shown to be not abusing the system. Animals and wives yes, but the system, no.

The MP Sir Hope Peter Viggers was forced to retire after spending £1645 on a "duck island". Looks like a great investment as he'll soon be living on it. He has now lost his job because of those ducks. I think the next time he rehouses them it may well be in a pancake with some hoisin sauce.

A new body will control Parliament finances. The government has set up OfParl. They should add F**k to the start. The Tories say only a new government in Westminster can save Britain. I agree. The Swedish one.

In any other profession they'd have been replaced years ago by an Indian call centre. I think that's how we should go at this. Sack all MPs and just have a team of 600 guys in Mumbai, working 24/7 running the country. "Press one to speak to your elected representative, press two to complain about the bins in your area, press three to declare war on Iran."

Feeling the heat.

Health chiefs are advising that all British homes should be painted white in order to cope with climate change.

Personally, I'm not sure how much difference reflecting the sun's heat is going to make to your house when it's 20 feet under water.

An Army test pilot is the first British astronaut. Tim Peake admits he's on the end of a very long waiting list to go into space. Which right now includes everyone on Earth. I can't wait to see a Brit up in space, grumbling about the weather. I just hope his spacesuit isn't supplied by the British Army. Solar radiation will make short work of a goldfish bowl taped to a bin bag.

Honour before greed

Story one on News At Ten last Wednesday was the latest revelation about high-spending, free-loading MPs. Story two was the coffins of four British soldiers returning from Afghanistan. It made for a stark juxtaposition.

On the one hand you have Government ministers and backbench MPs who have been squeezing every last penny out of a very generous allowance system to ensure their homes are equipped to a high standard. On the other, you have four brave young men laying down their lives in the service of this country. One a story of greed, the other a story of sacrifice. Two very different attitudes to public duty and serving this nation. What a contrast.

And it’s a contrast made starker still by news that urgent equipment needed by our troops on the front line in Afghanistan is still not getting through on time. Fewer than two-thirds of consignments – 57 per cent – reach our battle units on time. After eight years to get it right, that is surely not good enough. I spoke this week to a young officer who has just returned from Afghanistan and who told me they are still driving around in vehicles that offer inadequate protection. He lost men in a roadside bomb because better vehicles failed to arrive. They can equip their homes all right, but not our boys in the firing line.

HOLD ON TO YOUR HORSES.

Politicians are finally acting on the public outcry over their outrageous expense claims.

From now on, MPs are going to use a far fairer system of allowances, like the one used by President Ceausescu of Romania, just before he was marched from his golden palace and shot.

This has been a difficult subject to write jokes about when every time I try to exaggerate a punch line for comedic effect, an even more exaggerated expense claim is revealed.

I mean, what are they going to claim for next - a moat? Douglas Hogg was ridiculed for having a moat round his large mansion. To be fair, it is in the middle of a Sheffield Council Estate. Why does anyone need a moat cleaner? It's full of water. It kind of cleans itself. In his defence, the moat needed cleaning after the drawbridge broke under the weight of the chandelier being delivered.

In this country, let us not forget that a man's home is his castle. Although, in the case of many Conservative MPs, a man's castle is his second home.

Douglas Hogg claimed to have his moat cleaned and Michael Spicer claimed to trim the hedge around his helipad. They couldn't have made the Conservative Party look any more like aristocratic idiots unless they had claimed cash for "the lute player's fees to entertain the peacocks" and "a termination for scullery maid and third class ticket for her crossing to New Amsterdam".

Alex Salmond claimed £650 for curtains. To be fair, if his flat hadn't had curtains, we'd have paid out far more than that to his neighbours in compensation. Shadow ecology secretary Greg Barker has kept his green credentials through this scandal by keeping unused appliances and lights switched off in his second home. He has achieved this by not actually living there.

Many people have wondered why John Prescott needed to claim for two loo seats. Simple, one for each cheek. One MP claimed £135 to hire an electrician to "change the lightbulbs" in his house. Which, if nothing else, proves one thing: Politicians might be thieving b******s but they've got nothing on the real experts - tradesmen.

Ann Widdecombe has claimed the crackdown was going too far, saying: "It is becoming a competition that 'my shirt is hairier than yours'." If anyone is hairier, with or without a shirt, it's got to be Ann Widdecombe. If this expenses scandal gets any worse, they'll be digging a moat around Parliament.

Mr Hogg also paid £600 for someone to kill his moles. What was he killing them with? An Apache helicopter? The list of what MPs have claimed expenses for is incredible.

Tampons, horse manure, an ice cube tray, light bulbs and a chandelier. Coincidentally, those are the exact same items that Peter Andre has been offered in his divorce settlement.

Some MPs are still trying to justify the allowances system, saying that without it they would be forced to buy things using their salary. Last year, MPs were fighting against the disclosure of their second home expenses because they said it would be a risk to their security. It turns out it was a risk to the security of their overpaid jobs.

It was The Daily Telegraph that printed MPs' expense claims and its readers were furious. They have to pay for their own tennis courts, chandeliers and clean moats. One Tory showed she was still in touch with the public. Cheryl Gillian claimed £4.47 for cat food. Which is now the average British shopping list.

Oliver Letwin made a huge claim to have his "tennis courts modified". Judging by his multiple chins this means "fitted with a fridge". What I'd like to know is if MPs can claim for all those things, then what aren't they allowed to claim for? Chocolate fountains? Cream horns? Golden baths? Or are all those sexual practices allowed, too? The big news is the suspension of Elliott Morley. I think I'm with the general public when I say Elliott Who? Morley has been stripped of his role as international climate change envoy. Just as well, as his solution to climate change was for a second Earth about 100 miles away from the old one..

I.D cards

Id cards are to be made available from post offices. Fantastic! The queue in there already takes an hour and people are only buying stamps.

What's it going to be like when they're scanning irises and taking DNA swabs? The queue will be so long it will be quicker to have a letter delivered by passing it back along the line until it gets to your destination.

There are a lot of practicalities about the ID card scheme the Government don't seem have taken onboard. For example, how are they going to get fingerprints off people from Bicester? It's going to take at least a couple of hundred thousand years for their hooves to evolve that far.