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Britain’s Least Wanted

by | 21st, November 2005

‘THE sky really was falling in on Chicken Licken. Bird flu was coming to get him, and it was going to spread to Cocky Locky, Goosy Loosey and Henny Penny. And then Foxy Loxy and the King were going to get it. They were as stuffed as Turkey Lurky at Christmas time.

On Monday, the Mail was telling us that bird flu was mutating into a form that can be easily passed to humans. Over in Vietnam, chicken watchers had noticed that the virus was starting to change.

“We have to get the message through that this is going to be much more serious,” said Sir Liam Donaldson, the chief medical officer. The virus “will come”. “The fight will be an extended and protracted one… We can’t be alarmist.” Too late for that. We were alarmed – the Mail had seen to that.

And then there was that other bird who would do for us all – Kate Moss. Having corrupted the morals of London, Moss was heading to Little Faringdon, Oxfordshire.

Last time Moss was in town, widow Sylvia Griffiths, 82, said she was “disturbed many times late at night”. “She got a drum kit for Christmas and kept us up banging it,” said Sylvia.

And there was Wesley Hunt. He said that at Kate’s village parties there was “coke everywhere”. Oh? “Kate had her own special snorting room. It was a small lounge with a glass-covered table.”

Was there nowhere safe for us to be, the good, bird-flu fearing, non-celebrity masses? Perhaps Moss had hit upon something. Why not just put all the celebs and nasties in one place? Why not send them as far away from decent society as possible? Why not send them to a jungle clearing in Australia?

But who would go? The Mail knew. It told us that Jenny Frost was in the I’m A Celebrity holding bay. Jenny’s the uber-thin former member of Atomic Kitten. And there was Carol Thatcher, doing for her family’s honour what her mother Maggie once did for the British coal industry.

Others keen to sleep beneath the stars, and be mocked by Ant and Dec, were revealed to be: DJ Sara Cox (a woman who talks as if her mouth is already stuffed with beetles), Emmerdale actress Sheree Murphy, Food and Drink presenter Jenny Goolden, former Blue singer Antony Costa, Tommy Cannon, Sid Owen and Jimmy Osmond.

Let them east bugs! Well, bugs are better for them than the usual British fayre. On Tuesday the Guardian reported that it costs the health service more to deal with poor dietary habits than smoking, which is around £1.5 billion.

And over in the Telegraph, we learnt that children who were fed home-cooked meals were at a lower risk of heart disease.

Perhaps we should all eat bugs. Perhaps the celebs would outlive us all. Junk food would kill us, and the only humans left alive would be the small platoon of minor talents living in the Queensland bush.

And at their head would be Carol Thatcher. On Wednesday, the woman who would surely be leader of the human race was talking to the Express.

In “I’m a celebrity…don’t tell mum”, Thatcher said she was too frightened to tell Maggie she was on the show.

“I think she’ll probably be very critical,” said Carol of her mum, “I can’t say it’s her sort of show so I might just tell her that I’ve done it when I get back.”

Get back? What made Carol think she was coming back? Celebs will do pretty much anything to be noticed. If the show’s producers asked Carol and her tribe to remain in the jungle for the next few years, they surely would. They would develop the frontiers of reality TV. They would go into a new space.

On Thursday, the Times reported (“’Reality’ show stars will be taken for one galactic ride”) that plans were already afoot to blast a galaxy of our brightest stars into the cosmos.

We would thrill as Rebecca Loos tossed off a Martian. Delight as Jade Goody feasted on space kebabs. Swoon as Peter Andre showed planet Earth that his career could defy gravity for a third time.

But it was not real. It was a hoax. As the paper explained, the four contestants – selected from nine hopefuls preparing for a five-day orbit of Earth at the “Space Tourism Agency of Russia” – were going to remain on terra firma.

But why? Why not send them into space for real? On Friday we spotted the new Crimestoppers website. Inspired by the American FBI’s internet site of most dangerous criminals at large, the Crimestoppers version featured the UK’s most wanted.

“Have you seen any of the villains on Britain’s first FBI-style website?” asked the Mail. Readers were duly presented with mugshots of 12 felons, the so-called “Dirty Dozen”.

A quick once over revealed – surprisingly for the Mail – no picture of George Galloway, Cherie Blair or any Frenchman who worked at the EU.

But why not adapt the theme? Why not create the Least Wanted list and turn it into a reality TV show for celebs.

The chosen are then dressed as parrots and sent to a quarantine centre in Essex…’



Posted: 21st, November 2005 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink