Jobless Figures Do Not Include Peters

Mr Peters Learns He Has Not Been Sacked

Jobless numbers released today show unemployment is on the rise, even without Winston Peters being sacked.

The Department of Statistics announced today that 171,000 people were unemployed, a figure that could easily have been 171,001 had Mr Peters been dismissed by the Prime Minister earlier this week for making the sort of racist remarks that would have seen an ordinary employee sent down the road with an invitation not to let the door hit them on the arse on the way out.

“To be honest, we were holding off the release of the jobless numbers,” spokesperson for the Department of Statistics Stan Dard-Deviation said today.

“We had anticipated that Mr Peters probably would have been given the boot, the pink slip, his marching orders – call it what you will – and be axed, canned and out on his ear after his behaviour.” said Mr Deviation.

“But there was some uncertainty within the office whether the Prime Minister would have the balls to do it. So we finally had to make a call today that he wasn’t going to, so the jobless total is one less than it otherwise would’ve been.”

“On a side note there was in fact a sweepstake going on in the stats department office as to whether the PM would man up or not, and on the bright side I won twelve bucks, a result I as a statistician would describe as ‘better than average”.”

Read more