Scene: Piblington Baggage

A man sits on a cheap plastic chair. The factory space is cold, damp, and a bright light shines is his face. There is little sound except the the occasional drip of water.

Robert Hooksmith: Hullo? Is, is there anyone there? I’m very cold and someone’s tied me to this chair.

Elderly voice: Hooksmith, you sit before the Council of People. Your crime is the abandonment of ethics –

Robert: That’s not a law. I object!

Elderly voice: As I was saying, the abandonment of ethics and the unlawful cancellation around the ECHR.

Robert: Is this the toilets thing again? You woke nutters, you’ll –

Young voice: Silence! The European Court of Human Rights. Do you not pay attention to your own party’s briefings?

Robert: Well, yes, but there’s been a lot going on. I mean –

Child’s voice: Oh we know. We went thought your social media feed and work email.

Robert: But that’s private! You have no right to do such a thing.

A desktop bell pings.

Elderly voice: Let the court know that the former mayor has failed to understand the right to privacy.

Robert: This is madness. You have no power here!

Young Voice: Nice try, Theoden, but we do. You said you’d sign off on the removal of everyone’s human rights, so we are just taking things to their natural conclusion. Starting with you.

Child’s Voice: Plus using the same password with no second factor authentication is pretty stupid.

Robert: W-what are you blithering on about?

Elderly Voice: My learned colleague means you’re a twit. Besides, you waived your right to privacy by promising to sign.

Robert: Where’s my legal representative? I demand fair treatment.

The bell rings again.

Young Voice: Sorry, you revoked that too.

Robert: But, all those… foreigners and protesters coming to the town. I just wanted rid of them.

Elderly Voice: So you signed, so you could remove the right to assembly and expression, yes?

Robert: But I didn’t mean me.

Young Voice: Well, it would hardly be fair if the rules didn’t apply to everyone.

Robert: B-but, you can’t do this. What about my family, my friends at the church, the golf club?

Multiple bell pings

Robert: Will you stop doing that!

Child’s Voice: Listen, Mr Grumpy. I’m in charge of the bell. Each time you mention a right, I get to ping it. You’re lucky we went with this.

Robert: What did you want to do?

Elderly Voice: Someone suggested putting a hamster in your trousers each time.

Robert: That’s cruel! You know I have a phobia about rodents. That’s… it’s blooming torture!

Bing bing!

Child’s Voice: You’re right. Poor Hammy Hamster. Being subjected to that. It’s awful.

Younger voice: So, you are guilty as charged. The only question is the punishment to fit the crimes.

Robert: But I haven’t done anything!

Elderly voice: That’s partly true for the first time in your elected career. The schools still need repairing, the Police need funding for community patrols, the Library is only running because of volunteers, and the roads are still a mess. Yet, there’s plenty of money to make posters and trips, to bang on about small boats isn’t there? So, you decided to take the nuclear option –

Child’s Voice: And you wonder why you got burned. Can we vote for banishment?

Robert: Yes, that’s fine. I’ll leave the town. Let you run the place.

Young Voice: Banishment to the sea. Robert’s family tree states he is of… let me check… Viking and Norman ancestry.

Child’s Voice: I bet that was a fun Christmas with those lot all together.

Elderly Voice: To the sea! Place the ceremonial bag of shame upon his head, and set him adrift. A small boat for you and banishment to the whims of the sea!

Robert: No! No, you can’t do this, I could die out there.

Child’s Voice: I’ll skip the bell. I think you’re getting the message.

Robert struggles, but cannot escape his fate. He is put into a small boat and pushed into the water.

Robert: Tell my children I’m sorry. This, this has got out of hand. Please! Someone!

Robert's boat bobs along... in the community paddling pool.

Child’s Voice: Granny? My arm is getting tired. Do I have to keep using the water pistol on him?

Elderly Voice: It’s just part of the immersion process, petal. Don’t get it on the hood, as it’ll go in his eyes, though. That’ll sting.

Robert (shouting at a distance): Someone! Please! I never passed my 10M swimming lesson. Get the coastguard! Please! I feel ill.

Young Voice: He’s only been on there five minutes. The water’s nearly as shallow as he is.

Elderly Voice: How long should we give him?

Child’s Voice: I don’t think he’ll be getting his sea legs any time soon. Do you think he’ll change his mind, Granny?

Elderly Voice: Possibly, petal. Usually politicians, like the mayor, can be relied to do the right thing, once they’ve tried everything else.

Young Voice: We better fetch him. The local gulls are taking an interest and I don’t want to have to powerwash the mayor and the boat.