MARGO SPARGO CARGO EMBARGO!!

Trade between the People's Republic of China and Greater Relubbus is worth many hundreds of billions of pounds and is one of the mainstays of the global economic system.

 It is thus with the greatest shock that financial markets around the world have registered the news that China has imposed an embargo on the unloading of the cargo of the 555th ship of the Relubbus Containerships International Corporation (RCIC).

The RCIC ship in question is the Margo Spargo, named after the 12th, now sadly long deceased, wife of the Greater Relubbus Urban Council (GRUC) Leader Billy Spargo.

Mrs Spargo the 12th died 35 years ago in a mysterious nocturnal incident in Prospidnick involving a souped-up Ford Anglia, 52 bottles of Babycham, her pet ferret and a stout granite wall.

Readers with a long memory will recall the allegations of vote-rigging, which attached to Mrs Spargo's receiving the third place prize in the 1963 All-Penzance Miss Toilet Attendant of the Year competition.

The vessel Margo Spargo is the pride of the RCIC fleet, which is owned 25% each by world famous Relubbus business magnates and bitter rivals R.C. Oates and W.G. Trevaskis.

The Margo Spargo contains a cargo of freshly made, but frozen, pasties and oggs puddens destined for distribution across China.  Two ships arrive each week, sailing direct from Hayle to Shanghai, to supply the seemingly inexhaustible hunger for Cornish fare, which is likened by some to a new opium-like addiction.

The reason for this embargo by the Chinese government is believed to stem from the GRUC reluctance to share its advanced space technology with the Chinese.

The Cornish Space Institute, operating out of rooms at the Deep Sea Fishermen's Mission at Newlyn and led by Professor Tommie T. Thomas (pictured here in his favourite cowboy outfit presented to him by President George "Brains" Bush) has developed a new space travel technology, which is set to be the envy of the world.

The product of nearly three weeks of concentrated research by Professor Thomas (49) and his team has been the development and construction of the hitherto supersecret 'Properprober'.

This is a space travel machine which taps into and harnesses reversed black hole force to propel itself at speeds in excess of 106 times the speed of light.  Using this fabulous machine, Relubbus 'Propernauts' have already travelled to the edge of space and even peered over the edge.

Of course, this tremendous invention should still be secret.  However, it has emerged that a key project worker, Dr O.K. Okay, a former car mechanic at a well-known Penzance garage, has been slipping across to the Swordfish Inn, where he has fallen into conversation with the Chinese Ambassador to Relubbus, Mr Y.P. Lychee (52), who 'just happened to be passing'. 

It would appear that, having been plied with one beer too many, Dr Okay has spilled the contents of his mind, as well as of his stomach, into the receptive ear of this wily oriental diplomat.

The Chinese government then approached the GRUC Leader, Mr Billy Spargo (117) to ask if he would be willing to allow them to share in this technology.  Spargo flatly refused with the words "No, I bleddy aren't!"

The Chinese then promptly declared a trade embargo.  Councillor Spargo has summoned Mr Y.P. Lychee, the Chinese Ambassador (pictured) to the High Council Chamber in Boswedden Lane.

Meanwhile, the business world holds its breath and looks on fearfully. 

We will continue to report on developments as they occur.