The Race Relations Industry

State of the Art

Sir Aylwin Goth-Jones, the genial, unpopular Chief Constable of Stretchford, has two paramount concerns: the "war against drink-driving" and the "war against racism". Now that the triumphs of the "drink-drive season" - Christmas and the New Year - are behind him, he is concentrating on "racism". Always one to keep up with the advance of technology, he has issued prejudometers to all his senior officers.

The prejudometer is an electronic device, easily fitting in pocket or handbag, for testing racial prejudice. You simply point it at the person you want to test (including yourself), press a button and read off the result in prejudons, the internationally recognised scientific unit of racial prejudice.

Originally developed by Ethnicaids at their factory on the North Circular Road for use by the race relations industry, it can now be obtained from all good race relations stockists. No "anti-racist", professional or amateur, should be without it.

Last week Sir Aylwin ordered all his senior officers to report to his office, bringing their prejudometers. First he asked them all to test each other, then themselves. As he suspected, some scored as much as 150 prejudons on the Macpherson Scale; most scored at least 70, and only one, Chief Inspector Uriah Gloze, scored zero when he pointed the instrument at himself, slyly omitting to press the button.

"I am absolutely disgusted with you!" Sir Aylwin bawled. "As you know, I have not got a single racist bone in my body, and I expect you to be the same. Now all test your prejudometers on me."

He waited, smiling with conscious virtue. But when they read out their results, they found an average prejudon count of 130. One read 185. The instrument exploded in clouds of multicoloured smoke, behind which the policemen, shifting from one foot to another, concealed uneasy smiles.

But Sir Aylwin stood his ground. "The fact that the results are all different shows they are invalid," he shouted, stamping on one of the instruments. Now return all these stupid gadgets to Ethnicaids and get the money back."