Like an over-loved teddy bear Harriet Harman has evidently been put out of the reach of small hands until Mummy can get to her with needle and thread. So much can be inferred from the fact that Margaret Beckett (a politician for whom the answer to the question "Is she still alive?" has for some years been No) was disinterred and sent creaking into the world last night for the purposes of occupying the Labour seat on Question Time. Since this seat is the only one likely to remain in Labour hands after the next election, leaving it vacant would clearly be at best unwise.
Now QT is - as we all know - a bear-pit on an average night, and like watching the Christians thrown to the lions on a good one. In this case, there were several lions on the panel and a great number in the audience, giving the clear impression of a three-day convention at which only one small plate of vol-au-vents has been served.
To clarify the metaphor, Mrs. Beckett was the principal canape on that plate, and one would have felt sorry for her but for the self-serving and casuistic arguments that she brought to bear in order to justify her various positions.
The first of these is that Grace and Favour apartments are not given to politicians free of charge. How the lions roared with pity for those politicians faced with onerous duty of living (as Mrs. Beckett has done) at Chevening and One Carlton Gardens! Their eyes grew quite wet with hunger.
The second argument that she ventured is that the issue of politicians' pay was really much too complicated for us to understand and we should stop worrying our little heads about it. The lions nodded appreciatively at this argument and shook out their napkins with a renewed appreciation of their meagre intellectual abilities.
Best of all, however, was Mrs. Beckett's answer to the question as to whether she approved of The Telegraph's decision to publish the details of MPs' pay in the first place. Puff pastry that she was, all plump with chicken and mushroom, she had the timerity to argue that she condemned The Telegraph for having taken delivery of the personal details of (and at this point I insert a conspicuously unnecessary parenthesis for the true significance of this to sink in) MPs' staff.
The lions blinked at one another, uncertain as to whether their manes had fallen in their ears again.
No, they had it right first time. Evidently the concern of MPs at their dirty washing having been laundered in the full light of day is not directed towards themselves but entirely towards poor Muggins-in-the-office, slaving away at the paper shredder unconscious of the fact that the security of her data was about to be jeopardised by The Telegraph. (Since Muggins-in-the-office is quite probably a member of their own family, perhaps MPs are right to be concerned.)
At this point the lions paused for a snack and were later seen to be giving Mrs. Beckett's arguments full consideration as they flossed her out of their fangs.
2 comments:
A fine and flavoursome apercu of the programme in question - though I felt that the hitherto untouchable "Ming" Campbell fell off his tightrope a couple of times as well, while at time Theresa May looked positively in fear of her life. It was a measure of how MPs and their expenses monopolised proceedings that the CEO of McDonalds was not once called upon to justify the salt and fat content of meals served in his "restaurants".
Brilliant, R, just cracking. It was the most bizarre programme to watch - do they bay more in Grimsby and did every female trot along in bright pink so they could be pointed at by Dimbers as "the woman in pink." The Telegraph man, ole BB, looked as if he'd sent along a negative of himself and Desperate Dan of McD came out of things about the best. MB's gruesome blinking and strange lipstick will haunt my dreams for days.
Post a Comment