The government's self-support scheme launched in 1971. It's not known when the scheme finished because nobody could ever reach the government by telephone. Letters were returned with 'Not known at this address' written across them. Even when people turned up in London to complain in person, they discovered that many government buildings were just facades of the kind one might find on a film set. The Houses of Commons and Lords were in partial ruin, seemingly vacated years before, and had become home to goats, chickens and other livestock. This fact had only gone undetected for so long because the bleating and clucking of the animals coming from within the chambers was indistinguishable from those of their political predecessors.
