The Polish 2050 party has resolved that its membership will henceforth be administered from a moving tram, with the registry carried on board by a rotating team of officials who must complete every line of the Warsaw network before the first shift ends.
Party chairman Szymon Hołownia announced the arrangement at a press briefing in a conference room that had been emptied for the occasion. He said that the leadership had reached a decision that was, in his words, «unavoidable», and that the rotation would begin with the removal of the party's longest-serving secretary from the card index on the grounds that she had acted against the interests of the organisation and against resolutions adopted by its statutory bodies.
To carry out the decision, the party has issued a uniform for all registry staff: a navy jacket with the party emblem on the left sleeve, a cloth bag fixed to the wrist and a timetable printed on the inside of the collar. Thirty-one clerks have been assigned to the duty so far. Each one must hand a stamped form to every passenger who boards at the stop before their own, and each form must be returned before the doors close.
Party officials said that the rotation will be extended to the regional branches next month, beginning with Kraków, where the tram network is considered too slow to accommodate the number of signatures expected from the party's new members. Several branch managers have already requested larger bags.