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People of Fishguard at loggerheads with mayor
Wednesday 3rd October 2012 | Liam
Mayor refuses real tree until local youngsters stop 'severe vandalism'. Townsfolk say Christmas may as well be cancelled
The mayor of Fishguard, Pembrokeshire, is making a bid to out-do the Grinch this year by denying the coastal town a real Christmas tree. ‘Local youngsters,’ the mayor said, ‘cannot be trusted to not vandalise the tree. I mean, a bit of vandalism is fine. Spray-paint a large portrait of male genitalia on the wall of the leisure centre, hack down a pylon, slash a few tyres by all means. But the current wave of vandalism is just too severe.’
The town will have to make do with ‘another hologram,’ said former snooker player, part-time Father Christmas and bus driver Steve Davis, rolling his eyes, donning his fat suit and whipping the harnessed alpacas with fake antlers through the open windscreen of his minibus.
The decision was announced during a heated council meeting in which Cllr Maggie Stringer found herself avoiding a barrage of soft fruit and almost had to shout over the clattering of chairs against walls, masked youths smashing windows, and the crackling of a bonfire fuelled by the town hall’s plush décor. The caretaker, Alwyn Jones, said ‘it took me an absolute age to scrub those black smoke stains off the ceiling. But it doesn’t change my mind. I’m still furious about the Christmas tree.’
Local Fishguardians this week took to the streets with flaming torches, claiming that ‘the kids are only having a bit of fun.’ Head of Neighbourhood Alliance and part-time Mother Christmas, Sue Davis, made a plea to the mayor, saying, ‘Don’t you remember when you were a little tearaway, blowing up cars and spray-painting ‘PAEDO’ in large letters on the side of the house of the local paediatrician? This “vandalism” is no more “severe” than the time you set off that fart bomb in church and locked all the parishioners inside until the firemen arrived. Remember that, Cllr Stringer? Because as an alter girl with a weak bladder that day, I most certainly do.’
As the angry crowd marched through Fishguard town centre, chanting ‘Bring back Christmas!’ and ‘Kill the Grinch!’, they set alight to hanging baskets outside shops, kicked in the doors of local establishments, including the butchers and bakery (but curiously not the local candlestick makers or fireworks shop). From the bakery they dragged a large batch of dough out into the streets, into which the whole community pounded their anger and proceeded to roll the dough into a large boulder and bowl it into the council offices. ‘Merry Christmas to all!’ shouted local baker Hugh Davis through a megaphone.
After this late-night vigil, including a medley of Christmas carols sung around the charred remains of previous Christmas trees, the crowds dispersed around 12am. But amidst the doom and gloom and ‘mindless destruction,’ as councillors described the events, there was a silver lining. Local fish ‘n’ chip shops reported a massive increase in sales, with one reporting to have finally sold the battered sausages that have been sitting in their display cabinet all summer.
‘We had queues stretching back as far as the ferry port,’ said owner of The Codfather 3, Alan Davis, ‘I’ve never seen it so busy. The pork pies were literally flying out! It’s a shame about those cars that exploded and the ferry that was ransacked, but no one was too badly injured. So all in all, it was a successful night.’ Despite the slight ‘hiccup of law and order,’ as local police chiefs are calling the protests, they are positive that order will be restored once ‘the main bulk of the black plumes of smoke have died down and all fatalities have been accounted for.’
Cllr Maggie Stringer remains resilient. After escaping from her private helicopter by parachute, having narrowly evaded a ground-to-air missile deployed by local revolutionaries, the mayor, addressing aggrieved locals via live satellite from a nuclear bunker deep underground several miles off the Pembrokeshire coastline, said ‘I will not reverse the decision until I can be sure that as soon as we display a Christmas tree in the town centre it isn’t immediately hooked up to C-4 by bomb enthusiasts. It’s just too expensive to constantly replace these trees.’
It is feared that the people of Fishguard and the council will remain at loggerheads until a resolution is drawn up. A compromise involving a ‘synthetic’ Christmas tree has been offered but locals are standing proud. ‘We will accept nothing less than the finest Norwegian Spruce,’ said Sue Davis. Local cynic and tractor enthusiast Mark Davis-Jones Jr has suggested that this ‘is not about “severe vandalism”, it’s about a tight council that won’t even arrange weekly recycling collections.’ The saga is expected to drag on well into December.
By Liam McKenna
