The day was December 1st, not April 1st, when this newspaper carried a report on Sinn Fein policing proposals, so I can only presume it was not a leg-pull; and anyway, Sinn Fein's hurley-carrying friends don't pull legs, but dismantle them at the joints. Therefore we must assume that the Shinners' suggestions that firstly the Royal Ulster Constabulary must be disbanded completely and be replaced by a new force which is 45 per cent Catholic, 50 per cent female, 15 per cent homosexual, 2 per cent ethnic minorities, 3 per cent vegetarian, 1 per cent sado-masochist, 12 per cent red-haired, 0.5 per cent blind, 2 per cent wheelchair-bound, 1.5 per cent mountainy farmers, 17 per cent unemployed, and so on, is serious.
Well, sort of. Everything after the 2 per cent ethnic minorities is my own contribution to policing. The rest is genuinely part of the Sinn Fein policing document - though I see no reason on earth why my recommendations should not be, ah, taken on board, as we say in the business. Why should farmers in the Sperrins whose fond of sprightly Merino ewes called Gladys or Mabel be excluded from contributing to society at large? Why should lentil-munchers not get their quota on the force? And since one in 500 of the population of Northern Ireland has been killed in the Troubles, it stands to reason that 0.2 per cent of the new force - the Proportionately Allocated, Radically ethno-Sensitive Northern Ireland Police Service, or PARSNIPS - should be dead too.
Mitchell Principles
Alas, not everyone shares my scrupulous zeal for representationalism, but no matter. We should be grateful for the Sinn Fein document, for it adds to the gaiety of nations and has brought a little smile to our faces as the days shorten to a few minutes of wan, grey daylight around noon. Just the sort of thing to give to the troops, if you'll pardon the expression. I'm not alone, I'm sure, in feeling a deep gratitude to the bright lads and lasses of Sinn Fein-IRA for pausing amid the flurry of leg-breaking and expulsions - all of which show how dear to their hearts the Mitchell Principles remain - in order to cheer us in our midwinter gloom. God bless their knee-capping little green hearts.
But a few questions need answering. Firstly, what happens if you can't get your proportions right for PARSNIPS? Take homosexuals. Research shows that 1 per cent of the population is homosexual, but Sinn Fein wants to have 15 per cent of PARSNIPS members attracted to their own sex. All very sapphosodomophilic, you might say, but is it? Not many people actually want to be policemen or women, yet now the poor old homosexual community is expected to supply 15 times more recruits than its numbers would justify. Which means, of course, if somebody hurls a brick at a PARSNIP peeler - and, as the nightly forays to smash kneecaps prove, old habits die hard in Northern Ireland - the chances of beaning a homosexual are 15 times greater than they should be. Sounds suspiciously like what those politically correct characters in Sinn Fein would call "homophobia."
Ethnic minorities
And what about the ethnic minorities? Presumably they arrived in Northern Ireland in order to be doctors or run restaurants, and suddenly they find they're expected to provide 2 per cent of the police force. That being the case, they are presumably meant to supply 2 per cent of the lesbians too. A lot of ethnic minorities - such as the Bangladeshis, say - might have some interesting opinions about such expectations; after, that is, the equal-opportunities Sinn Fein PARSNIPS recruiting officer - lucky devil - has carefully explained what lesbians are. (They do what together?)
Poor devils come to Northern Ireland to open a curry house, and suddenly they find the womenfolk among them are expected to have sex with each other and stand in uniform on street-corners bobbing at the knees and murmuring "Evening, all" to passing strangers. Don't be surprised if the Bangladeshis up saucepans and come down to Dublin. PARSNIPS might well end up playing merry hell with Balti cuisine in the North.
And what are ethnic minorities? Are they the politically correct, Afro-Caribbean-Asian minorities so beloved on US campuses, or are they the genuine ethnic minorities of Northern Ireland - the English, say? The English, after all, are probably the largest minority in the North. Will Sinn Fein-IRA be complaining because English people are under-represented in PARSNIPS? What about the Ulster-Scots? Do they count as a minority? And will the chuckies be demonstrating outside PARSNIPS headquarters with their "Brits In" placards?
Former paramilitaries
They will, it seems, certainly be complaining if "human rights violators" within the current RUC are employed in its replacement force, though ex-RUC members might just be allowed to join PARSNIPS. However, Sinn Fein is opposed to former paramilitaries being excluded from PARSNIPS. In fact, the integration of former combatants into the security forces "is a significant feature of many conflict resolution situations." So the happy, happy Six Counties can look forward to a blissful future in which policing falls to lesbian knee-cappers and gay pub-bombers, plus, course, Fatima from Dacca, looking decidedly unhappy on the beat with Sharon, a transsexual serial killer from Ballymena. And the silence of the new police force!
For as they say down the country, PARSNIPS utter no fine words.