Martial law declared as Independents' decision sparks riots. Vote Smart Exclusive.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(Free-Press-Release.com) September 7, 2010 -- Coalition rampage as two independents side with Labor

Parliament House in flames

National Library archives hurled into Lake Burley Griffin

Windsor’s head bobbling atop Captain Cook fountain

Siege at High Court

Expectations that 22 million Australians would heave a sigh of relief with an end to the protracted two-week negotiations to select a new government have been dashed by a riot triggered by the decision of two of the three rural independents to support a minority Labor government, giving Julia Gillard a one seat majority.

The announcement, which ended more than two weeks of political uncertainty and an epidemic of self-inflicted asphyxiation as people held their breath in anticipation, triggered a new crisis when the Coalition refused to accept the decision of the two independents and moved to seize power through extra-parliamentary means.

The crisis began with a frisson caused by Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey at the press conference called by Tony Windsor and Rob Oakeshott to announce their decision, but within half an hour it had escalated to the point where Governor General Quentin Bryce was forced to call on the armed forces to restore order.

As a result, as of 3.30pm Australia was operating under a state of emergency with the Governor general exercising executive authority along side the Chief of the Defence Force, Air Chief Marshall Angus Houston.

The drama began at 3.00pm when half way through an explanatory statement by Tony Windsor outlining his reasons for supporting Julia Gillard a sobbing Joe Hockey stormed the stage clutching a kebab.

With his mouth full and garlic sauce dribbling down his chin Hockey used his spare hand to grab a chair, which he then used to assail Windsor.

Bob Katter, who had earlier announced he was supporting the Coalition, attempted to intervene by removing his 10-gallon hat and using it to strike Hockey and drive him from the podium.

In the confusion Hockey dropped some meat from his kebab, which only served to further infuriate him and after stuffing the remaining portion into his mouth he added a microphone stand to his arsenal and began flailing wildly.

Andrew Wilkie was the first to go down, screaming, “I’m hit! I’m hit” after he was struck across the shoulder with the chair.

Rob Oakeshott then attempted to disarm Hockey but was driven back by a spray of semi-masticated kebab as the member for North Sydney started to scream abuse while swinging the microphone stand and chair.

Bob Brown was the next to enter the fray, leaping onto Hockey’s back and being tossed around like a drunken rodeo rider.

But despite his furious gyrations the shadow treasurer, who rumours suggest had borrowed $250,00 to buy a new boat in the belief that he would soon enjoy a substantial salary increase as a Minister, failed to dislodge Brown.

As the two men ricocheted across the stage scattering furniture and toppling an Australian flag, Oakeshott seized the initiative to temporarily daze Hockey by shattering a crystal vase across his head.

However just as the independents appeared to be gaining the upper hand a phalanx of 15 Liberal women led by Mrs Christopher Pyne and Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, a grand niece of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, crashed through the rear doors.

Shouting obscenities and chants resurrected from Mussolini’s 1935 invasion of Abyssinia, and armed with weapons ranging from expensive tennis racquets to hot curling wands, they rushed the stage, trampling media and parliament house staff in the process.

As those journalists not killed or severely injured in the assault scrambled for the doors the women quickly overpowered the independents and trussed all except Katter to wooden poles hewn from rare native timbers used in the Great Hall.

The independents were then carried out in a manner similar to that used by New Guinean highlanders to carry wild boar slaughtered during a hunt; tied upside down by the front and back legs to a pole strung between two bearers.

The independents were carried into the House of Representatives where the remaining members of the Coalition had already taken up seats on the government side of the house.

They were untied and placed on the cross benches as members of the NSW Young Liberals adorned in brown shirts with digitised images of Tony Abbott dressed as Napoleon on the breast pocket held sharpened knives to their throats.

Four members of the Coalition Senate team then led a terrified speaker Harry Jenkins into the chamber at gunpoint, before forcing him to take his seat and ordering him to call for a “vote of confidence in the Abbott government”.

As Jenkins raised his gavel members of the ALP began abseiling from guide ropes tossed from the visitors gallery and within seconds the House resembled a barroom brawl in a Sam Peckinpah Western with wrestling MPs scattered throughout the chamber, using a visiting group of school children as human shields, swinging from chandeliers, and tumbling spectacularly from the press gallery before crashing onto the dispatch box.

Amidst the commotion, Bob Katter stood alone on the speaker’s table, saluting and singing the national anthem in an attempt to draw attention back to himself as a mass of wrestling bodies churned at his feet.

After several minutes a loud explosion signalled the arrival of Labor reinforcements from the Senate, led by Senator Mark Arbib steering an Abrahams tank into the chamber and instructing Senator Chris Evans, who was manning the cannon, to take aim at Tony Abbott and Julie Bishop, who were in the process of garrotting Health Minister Nicola Roxon.

The sight and sound of the turret turning towards the leaders of the Liberal Party caused most of the Coalition to flee towards the doors, but in their wake they set off a series of flares which sparked small fires which quickly spread and engulfed the chamber before claiming the rest of the $1 billion building.

The fleeing Coalition members, minus nine who were laying dead or dying on the floor of the House, headed for the basement car park where they commandeered a fleet of Commonwealth vehicles and headed for the National Library, sealing the entrances and setting fire to the Treasury building on the way.

At some point between their assault on the Treasury and storming of the National Library several of the independents either expired from wounds received during the mêlée on the floor of the House or were executed by their captors.

A tour group from South Korea was treated for shock at the scene after seeing two members of the Coaltion use a small rental paddle craft to approach the James Cook memorial jet fountain and toss the severed heads of Tony Windsor and Green MP Adam Bandt into the plume of water.

As Vote Smart goes to press the heads can be seen bobbling together like a couple of coconuts at the peak of the fountain.

After ransacking the Library and throwing much of its irreplaceable collection of Australian political history into lake Burley Griffin the marauding members of the Coalition sprinted 300 meters to the High Court where they tied up all the jurists, except Justice Susan Kiefel, and moved to suspend the constitution and declare martial law.

Minutes after Kiefel had sworn herself in as the new Chief Justice she prepared to take a truncated oath of office from Abbott but was interrupted by a detachment of Australian Army commandoes, acting on instructions from the Governor General, who had launched an assault on the building from the forecourt of the Department of Finance.

However confusion deepened when those Labor members who had escaped the conflagration at parliament house commenced a simultaneous amphibious attack from the lake at the back of the High Court.

Led by Bill Shorten, wearing a bullet holed nineteenth century British admiral’s hat and with a stuffed cockatoo on his shoulder, the Labor members stormed ashore from a flotilla of makeshift canoes fashioned from used beer kegs and immediately charged at the rear entrance.

However small arms fire from the High Court canteen quickly forced them to seek cover in the sculpture garden at the rear of the National Gallery.

At this stage a stalemate ensued, with the Coalition and Justice Kiefel holding other members of the High Court and participants in a high school mooting competition hostage in the High Court while 100 commandoes face the building from the south and around 55 surviving Labor members block the exists to the north.

Sniper fire from the High Court canteen and from Labor members holed up in the gardens of the National Gallery continue to pose a risk to civilians and for this reason the National Capital Major Events Corporation has postponed this evening’s recital of Aram Khachaturian’s Symphony No.2 (Symphony with Bells) at the National Carillon.

Chief Minister Jon Stanhope said patrons with tickets for tonight's performance can use them for tomorrow evening's scheduled show or return them to their place of purchase for a full refund.

For further information: truthwright@votesmart.com.au, mobile: 0451 950 394.

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