No Future Ch 15

XV

Faith and Charity

Eric Esterhazy MP

2044

After the applause had died down, Reverend Dawkins once again addressed the televised audience seated ahead of her in the town hall. She had a hard fight ahead of her. Only the barest minority were sympathetic to her. Most of the applause was reserved for Eric Esterhazy, the Minister for Housing and MP for Redhill & Surrey, who had just spoken.

"I don't accept that the shelter we provide for refugees from the nuclear wastelands of India and Pakistan can in any way be described as a 'conduit for immigration'", she said steadily and evenly. "Our mission is to extend compassion to our fellow human beings. The refuge cannot be described as a 'gateway for refugees'."

"Do you intend to deport the people you shelter back to where they come from when they're fit and able to return?" asked Emily Littlejohn, the Fox News UK anchor who was hosting the discussion.

"I think 'deport' is putting it rather strongly," said the vicar.

"Deport them is exactly what you should do," said Eric Esterhazy MP. "The British Isles are overcrowded. We can't cope with yet more immigrants, refugees or whatever you want to call them. If we want to provide a reasonable level of housing, education and medical care to our British citizens, then immigration policy must be vigorously enforced."

"Is it government policy to deport immigrants?" asked the host.

"It

is

when they've entered the country illegally," said the Minister. "In fact, it's the same policy in all countries in the European Union. It's the policy of most states in the USA. It is the right policy. Otherwise, it's unfair on British citizens who're looking for employment in these straitened times. The country is overcrowded. Jobs are hard to find. We have to be realistic."

"And how do you respond to that, reverend?" asked the host.

"I think you're putting too much focus on the question of immigration and not enough on our moral responsibility," said Diane. "Christians have a moral duty to help those in need. There are hundreds of millions of people throughout the Indian subcontinent who are in desperate need of help."

"I don't think Her Majesty's Government can allow this country to accommodate an extra hundred million British citizens," said Eric Esterhazy MP without waiting to be invited to reply by the host and whose remark was rewarded by thunderous applause from the audience.

Eric observed the reverend as she spluttered a response to the host's follow-up questions, but he knew that she'd never really had a chance. Fox News UK was a good friend of the Conservative Party, particularly in the relatively affluent South East. As the BBC continued to decline as a media presence, Fox News UK was now Britain's most influential and powerful news outlet. He never had reason to fear an invitation to appear on a Fox News program, especially on home turf, whereas he would only appear on the BBC when instructed to do so by Conservative Central Office.

Reverend Diane Dawkins was the token liberal on a panel of four guests in which Eric held the fulcral position as the voice of moderation. The other two guests were Karen Mackenzie, an author of books which claimed to expose the extent by which the liberal minority routinely distorted scientific evidence to serve its interests, and Horace Cutler, the token black guest whose strident views opposing immigration were somewhat less moderate than the Housing Minister's.

Eric was quite content to watch Horace launch a vitriolic attack on the reverend. He patronisingly questioned the kind of Christianity she represented, disparaged the workshy immigrants from Rawalpindi, and emphasised that the United Kingdom should tighten immigration controls along with the rest of the European Union, an institution he normally had no time for.

"It's not racist to want tighter immigration control," said Horace, aware that his skin colour independently affirmed that. "The world is a crowded place. There is famine, war and plague on every continent. The UK's interests are best served by keeping such problems as far out of reach as possible."

"The troubles of any one of God's creation is a matter for us all," said the reverend.

"I admire your well-meaning compassion," said Eric, acting in his self-appointed role as the panel's moderate, "but misguided liberal benevolence is precisely why the world is in the mess it is today. If the less developed nations acted more in their self-interest rather than choosing to rely on the charity of wealthier governments, there wouldn't be so many people unable to rely on their own governments for help."

"Surely the plight of the millions displaced by nuclear war deserves our compassion," pleaded the reverend.

"It is not in the interests of the UK to correct the mistakes made by other nations," said Karen Mackenzie who was utterly unsentimental with regards to such matters. "If two nations should bomb each other that is their choice. The British taxpayer shouldn't have to pick up the tab for their monumental folly. Surely it's bad enough that we have to suffer from the nuclear waste that was thrown into the sky."

However much satisfaction Eric was getting from this mismatched debate, he had to acknowledge that there were still too many obstacles in the way of successfully implementing a sensible immigration policy. The electoral reform that took place so many years ago had made British politics indecisive and vacillating. Coalition government followed coalition government. The Conservatives might be the chief party in the coalition, but they had to compromise with the Liberals, the Democrats and the rest on the left of the coalition. Although Eric was a Tory through and through, his sympathies were more with those in the British Independence Party and the UK National Party on the coalition's right.

Immigration wasn't the only issue that troubled Eric, of course. Taxes were too high. Ten percent income tax was just robbery. VAT at thirty-five percent, although less of a worry, was similarly too high. Too much money was being squandered on failed government schemes to build flood defences, develop alternative energy, house undeserving and drug-addicted wastrels, educate young hooligans, and provide medical treatment for the wilfully obese. And all the while, England and the rest of the UK were going to the dogs. It now ranked as only the fourth richest country in Europe. A nation no longer qualified to be a member of the G10 on the basis of GDP. A once proud nation whose pitiful military capability relied too heavily on buying arms from China and Russia. The streets of Redhill and Reigate were overflowing with unemployed yobs who indulged in drug binges at the taxpayers' expense. Things were not the way they should be and without a firm hand they were only going to get worse.

When the recording of the television discussion was finished, Eric shook hands with the host and the other three guests, taking care to be especially polite with Reverend Diane Dawkins. She was, after all, one of his constituents as well as being one of those most likely to blog, tweet or otherwise publicise her differences of opinion from those of the Minister of Housing.

He then strode over to shake hands with Dick Tebbit, the producer of

Town Hall Live

.

"Good show as always, Eric," said Dick. "You showed the pinko where to get off."

"Don't think it'll make any difference, Dick," Eric said sadly. "She'll carry on harbouring refugee scum and there's not a bloody thing anyone can do to stop her."

"Nothing will change while the coalition government gives cabinet seats to pinkos," said Dick. "The Immigration Minister is particularly weak. Davison might just as well fling the doors wide open and say 'Come on! Come in! Everyone's welcome to a free meal on us.'"

"It's broad-based coalition, Dick."

"Broad enough to have queers, greens and pinkos obviously, Eric. The Tories need reforming. Get rid of the TINAs."

"TINAs?"

"Tories In Name Alone. It's a labelling tactic that worked in the States. Look how well unadulterated conservatism is doing over there."

"Not well enough," said the Minister. "I just don't know how long the States are going to remain United. Those Northern and Western States are getting increasingly resentful about the Republicans' grip on government."

"That's their problem, not ours," said Dick. "Look, I've got an post-shoot party at the Reigate Regency. We've booked a three-bedroom suite. There's someone there I'm sure you'd like to meet."

"Is she anything like the last one," laughed Eric. "She had massive tits and a big fat arse."

"She was good though, wasn't she?"

"Bloody good!" Eric said with a chuckle as he recalled her amorous jigging between his legs. "What time shall I turn up?"

Eric's time was constrained by the need to attend his constituency surgery for which he was always late and which he conducted as rarely as he could get away with. He was an important Government Minister after all. After this, he phoned his wife to tell her that he had important government business and ordered a taxi to take him to the stately Reigate Regency. This was a hotel which if it didn't now provide a discreet and expensive service for the well-heeled would long ago have gone the way of most hotels in a country where tourism had mostly collapsed due to the exorbitant cost of travel.

Eric wasn't disappointed by the girls on offer. Fox News UK had an extensive entertainments budget which easily extended to cover the cost of hiring good quality whores. The minister observed with satisfaction how much the class of women who took up prostitution as a career had improved, despite the exacting penalties Eric's government had introduced for making that choice. A high proportion almost certainly belonged to the very population of illegal immigrants Eric was most eager to deport. Not that this was an observation that troubled Eric too much. Principles are only principles after all. And it gave the minister a certain wicked satisfaction to know that if these women were deported back to whichever famine-stricken, radioactive or deforested shit-hole they'd escaped from he'd have fucked them twice: once literally (and usually up the arse) and once again figuratively but with rather more sustained ill effect.

On this occasion he was able to enjoy the company of Dune and Emerald which names he was certain neither had been originally christened with. In fact, as one girl quite clearly came from one of the quarrelling Stans to the south of Russia and north of Tibet and the other was almost certainly from either India or Pakistan, they wouldn't have been 'christened' at all in the Christian sense of the word. Their English wasn't that bad, although Dune, the Uzbekistani or Turkmenistani, had some difficulty with pronunciation. But Eric wasn't there for conversation and the girls didn't have to say much as he fucked the one in the arse, as he preferred, and let the other push her tongue inside the hairy recesses of his buttocks.

Eric was a harsh lover—not that his wife was especially aware of this—and the girls were soon covered in bruises and slaps which would soon settle down and not unduly trouble their next patron. When he left them—sobbing slightly, as he preferred, the mascara dripping down their cheeks and a small trickle of blood coming from Emerald's anus—Eric was in a thoroughly good mood. This had been enhanced, of course, by the lines of coke that accompanied his energetic lovemaking.

"Good girls, aren't they?" said Dick when Eric returned to the main room of the party. Most guests were gathered around a holo-screen that showed nothing more shocking than Fox News UK's headline roundup and the usual pictures of Islamic terrorists being rounded up in the Southern United States as part of the new zero tolerance policies.

"Bloody good!" agreed Eric.

He looked around him. As usual, there was a public display of sex on the sofa. Emily Littlejohn was probably the only one amongst the naked men and women who wasn't being paid to perform. Most of the guests were like Eric and preferred to enjoy sex where they couldn't be watched and appraised. Judging by the company with which she was so intimately engaged, Emily obviously liked her cock and cunt to be black or brown.

"I told you I had someone here I thought you ought to meet, Eric," said Dick who guided the Minister towards Sir David Coulson, Chief Executive for Fox News UK, whose expensively suited back was ahead of him.

"Oh, hello Eric," said the honoured news executive as he shook Eric's hand. "We have a lot to talk about, you and me. There's much that I'd like to do for the country and common decency, and I believe that you may be the man to help me. However, you will need to excuse me momentarily."

He nodded downwards at the Asian woman whose mouth was pumping up and down on his erect penis.

"Certainly, Sir David," said Eric who knew better than to expect one of the most powerful people in the country to drop everything for him. "I'll wait by the drinks cabinet with Dick."

"Good man," said the executive who slapped his erect penis onto the woman's cheeks and let a drool of spit fall from his mouth and onto her eyes.

He was obviously enjoying this encounter rather more than she was.