Prisoners released early for Edinburgh festival

In July, Edinburgh Prison set free over a hundred prisoners under the government's early release scheme.

Rather than making space for new prisoners, the Edinburgh scheme helps boost prison service finances. 'It's simple,' explained a Prison Service accountant and former embezzler. 'We can rent out cells in D wing to Edinburgh festival acts and make a mint. Accommodation in Edinburgh is so expensive that we can charge £300 a night for a cell, or £600 for single occupancy.'

Jerry Lafferty, not his real name, has a musical comedy act. He performs daily on The Royal Mile and hopes one day to perform in one of the venues. He told us that D wing is easily better than anywhere else that he's stayed during the Fringe.  'This place is secure, it has a curfew at 10.30pm so you can sleep without being disturbed, meals are at regular times, and it has an exercise yard. That's already better than most Airbnb's.  I do get teased a bit - my act is criminal, I have to lock the audience in, I've got a cell out show, etc. - but I don't mind. My colleagues are all sleeping on Waverley Station or in a van in the B&Q car park, so the joke's on them.'

Edinburgh prison is doing so well out of the scheme that it may be adopted more widely.  Shepton Mallet prison is quite handy for Glastonbury, Cheltenham prison could rent out cells during Gold Cup week, and Manchester prison could be used every Saturday for home games.

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Northerners not actually that hard

Generations of received wisdom about regional toughness have been thrown into doubt after water scientists confirmed that people in London and the South East are officially considerably harder than people in Manchester, Liverpool and most of Yorkshire.

The discovery was made after researchers realised that maps showing water hardness could also be used to settle arguments about which parts of Britain are hardest. 'London is absolutely rock hard,' said one hydrologist. 'You only have to look inside a kettle. After six months it looks like it’s been concreted.'

By contrast, Manchester was classified as 'soft', while large parts of Scotland were found to be so soft that researchers have advised residents not to make eye contact with anyone from Kent.

The findings have caused particular embarrassment in Yorkshire, where generations of men have cultivated a reputation for toughness despite apparently washing in something with roughly the mineral content of Evian. 'We’ve always regarded ourselves as hard,' said one Leeds resident. 'But apparently people in Croydon are substantially harder. I’m struggling to process it.'

'That’s what makes people from Kent so formidable,' said a spokesman. 'Every cup of tea is basically a geological event.'

Newcastle has disputed the methodology, arguing that hardness should be measured by willingness to go out in February without a coat rather than milligrams of calcium carbonate per litre.

The government is now considering replacing the traditional North-South divide with a new national classification system ranging from 'Glasgow: incredibly soft' to 'Margate: fucking granite'.

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Joke candidate wins Clacton by-election

The Clacton by-election has been won by a comedy caricature who doesn't look human, or have any humanity.

The caricature was developed by Nigel Farage, a millionaire commodities trader, as the mainstay for a satirical show called 'BBC News'.

His long running gag-character, a gilded, thin-skinned kleptocrat alien candidate running for election in a constituency he has never been to, in a country he obviously hates, for a people he wants to ethnically cleanse, has been very popular in Clacton.

"I love his costume made of gold and pound notes, which he defrauded me of in front of my face whilst blaming immigrants', said Phillipa, a Clacton resident, "I fall for it every time."

A spokesperson said: “police advised Farage to hold this election, due to a credible threat against his credit-rating.”

This latest antic comes a decade after his famous 'Brexit' caper, where he fooled over 17m UK voters into thinking they'd be "better off" leaving the EU, humorously costing each of them over £3,000 per year.

In a follow-up stunt he convinced them to elect a novelty persona, an incompetent who spoke entirely in pig-latin, Boris Johnson, as a Prime Minister whose toxic and chaotic response to the Covid outbreak likely caused a hilarious 23,000 excess deaths.

Allegations that he looked surprised at these results have been rejected by Farage, who insisted 'that's just how I look'.

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