A game of Monopoly being played by the Henderson family of Watford took a surprise twist today when the Bank of England stepped in with a rescue package to save one of the key players, Mr Henderson, from what the Chancellor described as ‘almost certain bankruptcy.’

The deal, which had been thrashed out in the early hours between Alistair Darling and Mr Henderson, who was acting as the banker, means that each player will receive a £1 billion pound injection of cash, (although this may take some time to count out what with having to use up all the yellow one pound notes). The short-term borrowing deal led to furious protests from the rest of the Henderson family, who complained that it was unfair to use their money to bail out Mr Henderson so that he could go back to ripping them off.

As Mrs Henderson put it ‘He’s the one who spent recklessly at the start of the game. He was going around in a top-hat buying up properties like Old Kent Road. And now they’re worthless he expects us to get him out of the mess he’s in.’ However, Alistair Darling insisted that the measures were necessary. ‘Demand for the little houses and hotels had reached an all-time low. We are revising earlier predictions that we would actually run out of little green houses and have to use the counters from ‘Coppit’ instead.’

Mr Henderson had tried to raise money by auctioning Mayfair, but no bids were forthcoming – not even when he offered to throw in Fenchurch Street Station and ‘let them off the first time they landed on one of his hotels’. Tension in the game had been high after Mrs Henderson had won second prize in a beauty contest, and Mr Henderson had joked ‘Yeah, but there were only two people in it!’

In an emergency statement to the House of Commons, Gordon Brown gave his backing to the rescue package, warning that there was simply no option. ‘If we allow Mr Henderson to go bankrupt, others will follow, and in time there will only be one winner.’ Ignoring cries of ‘Isn’t that the whole point?’ the Prime Minister went on to reveal that as a condition of the loan, players would have to show more responsibility in future. ‘There will be no more of this paying yourself £200 just for passing Go. Players have to learn that there is no such thing as a Get Out Of Jail Free Card… Oh hang on what’s this?’

NewsBiscuit (similar subject area to posts by Stan Laurel, Gav P and others)