Polly Toynbee
by Boris Johnson in The Daily Telegraph
In so far as New Labour has a fairy godmother, Polly is the girl
It is easy to make fun of Polly Toynbee. It is easy to convict her of hypocrisy; but she genuinely knows and cares about the bottom 20 per cent …(she) has made herself an authority on the evils of Gordon Brown’s high taxes on low earners
Polly Toynbee the Tory guru: that’s barking. Or maybe not
Nah, I said to myself. You have got to be kidding me. I squinted again at the Guardian headline on the mat, and felt all funny. Someone, I whispered, is pulling my leg. You all know of course that I am a voortrekker of the Cameron movement. You realise, I hope, that I positively breathe the spirit of the solar-powered, bike-riding, glacier-friendly modernising tendency of which I am proud to be a part.
But when I saw yesterday’s Guardian, I almost swooned. A new ideological guru had been found for the Tory party, smirked the paper in triumph – and it was Polly Toynbee! The author of the new position paper was none other than my brilliant friend Greg Clark, MP for Tunbridge Wells, with whom I found myself recently in total agreement at the Tory conference.
Greg! I gasped: what are you saying? Not Polly! For Telegraph readers unfamiliar with her work, Polly used to be the BBC’s health and social affairs correspondent, and now writes a weekly column in the Guardian.
In so far as New Labour has a fairy godmother, Polly is the girl. She incarnates all the nannying, high-taxing, high-spending schoolmarminess of Blair’s Britain. She is the defender and friend of everyone whose non-job has ever been advertised in the Guardian appointments page, every gay and lesbian outreach worker, every clipboard-toter and pen-pusher and form-filler whose function has been generated by mindless regulation. Polly is the high priestess of our paranoid, mollycoddled, risk-averse, airbagged, booster-seated culture of political correctness and ‘elf ‘n’ safety fascism. In an ideal Polly Toynbee world, private sector broadcasting would be banned, Rupert Murdoch would be nationalised, and the BBC would hire thousands more taxpayer-funded social affairs correspondents to psalm the benefits of social democracy.
In Polly Toynbee heaven the NHS would drive out all private competition, and taxes would go up to fund it. How the hell, you may ask, can a proper Tory find anything to admire in Polly’s world view? All I can say is that when I had come out of my faint, and read what Greg was saying, I saw, naturally, that he was absolutely right. In spite of all she gets wrong, there are things that Polly says that are serious and true, and that any Conservative government should be saying. I don’t just mean her stance on fox-hunting, admirable though it is. I recall some powerful pieces in favour of the immemorial rights of the British to slaughter foxes – as you might expect from a gel who is a descendant not just of various ineffably grand Toynbees but also of Gilbert Murray and the Earls of Carlisle. More important still, she is also deeply conservative and Conservative in some of the things she does, as opposed to the things she says.
She joins the usual Labour snarling against fee-paying education, and selective education of all kinds. In reality, of course, she is the beneficiary of a highly selective education and also sent her own offspring to one of the most expensive and competitive public schools in the country, an establishment way beyond the means of most people.
Of course there will be those who accuse her of monstrous hypocrisy, and wonder how she can write her hate-filled philippics about selection in education, and how on earth she can insist on imposing a one-size-fits-all comprehensive system on the rest of the country, and close down the opportunities of so many poor but bright kids, when she has so ruthlessly maximised the opportunities of her own children.
To which I reply: oh well, of course she is a hypocrite; but by their deeds shall ye know them! Never mind the rhetoric of her Guardian column. In her actions, Polly emerges as someone who cares about securing the best possible chances for her own children, and in that way she is bowing before the strongest and deepest conservative force of all, a great and immutable fact of human nature, a truth of biology and motherhood compared with which a thousand hypocritical Guardian columns are nothing but chaff.
Then there will be those who complain that it is hypocritical of Polly to have her lovely second home in Italy, to which she doubtless repairs on so many cheapo flights that she has personally quilted the earth in a tea-cosy of CO2; to which I say, yes, it probably is wrong of Polly to keep calling for higher taxes when that would put such opportunities – for air travel to second homes – beyond the reach of millions slightly less fortunate than her. But never mind the hypocrisy: look at the fundamental Tory behaviour. At least she’s renting the villa out at pretty keen rates. Good on you, Polly! You can’t buck the market, as Mrs Thatcher used to say.
And the private-school-using, villa-owning Polly Toynbee is also right in this paramount sense: that if natural Tories like Polly are to have a hope of governing this country again, then they must show that they know and care about what life is like for those who do not have it as easy as they do.
It is easy to make fun of Polly Toynbee. It is easy to convict her of hypocrisy; but she genuinely knows and cares about the bottom 20 per cent. She is right that there are too many people in poverty under this Government, and right that they are overworked and overtaxed. It is a deep conservative insight that life is competitive, and that there will always be people who can get into the good schools, because they have Toynbee genes or money, and there will be people who are less lucky.
And if you believe that there must always be winners and losers – as I do – then you must understand that a healthy society will do its best to look after the losers. She may be a hypocrite, she may be a solid Thatcherite in her approach to property rentals and private education, but Polly Toynbee has made herself an authority on the evils of Gordon Brown’s high taxes on low earners, and for that alone she deserves respect. Greg Clark is right. Welcome to the Tory party, Polly. Let’s all have tea!
117 Comments
Modern Life is Beyond Satire ( or even burlesque )part 482-
Would you believe it I have been roped into being Santa Claus at a Child centre place by Mrs N.
It is true; you are under strict intructions not to sit a child upon your knee and to avoid contact.
How sad …I can do the ho ho ho but thats about it .
Another paedophile atrocity foiled. Phew!!!
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newmania’s what class am I quiz ?
1 Does either of your parents have tattoo?
What an absurd question
2 Were you educated at the states expense
Yes
3 Do you like X factor
I’m deaf, so rarely watch TV
4 Did you ever devote a lot of time to dance impressively at clubs
No – married too young – was an ace dancer though
5 Did you play out ?
Yes
6 Did either of your parents attend any educational establishment after 16
Yes
7 Can you fight , or have you ?
I scratched another girl once, wicked thing to do, found her through Friends Reunited and apologised to her a few years ago, no other fights as a child. As an adult, I was carried out of a Stop Stansted Expansion demo once – in a semi-sitting position, difficult to do that – it took three of them to haul me up from my sit in protest on the floor. Handed myself in to one of the police officers afterwards, of course – he didn’t wish to arrest me.
I once chased Two Jags round his massive, ‘wow factor’, experimental housing estate near here – told to him to stop concreting over the South East, to give some of houses away and to find some other stooges to pay his massive pension.
Has anyone in your family ever done anything creative for a living
Need you ask? Yes, my parents
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Flo you have lived . My answers are pure prole for that lot. These things can be complex though. I `m quite the provincial bourgeois in other ways .
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Newmania – here are my answers to your quiz. Not sure what it makes me.
1 Does either of your parents have tatttoo?
No way.
2 Were you educated at the states expense?
I attended state primary school, did 6 weeks at a local comprehensive, then when to prep school and public school.
3 Do you like X factor
Love it!
4 Did you ever devote a lot of time to dance impressively at clubs
Nope. I’m a terrible dancer and have always preferred a chat in the pub.
5 Did you play out?
In and out. We had a good sized house and garden and plenty of fields and woods in the surrounding area. Surrey was not too dangerous in the 1980s, so my folks didn’t have much to worry about.
6 Did either of your parents attend any educational establishment after 16?
No. Both left school at 15 or 16.
7 Can you fight, or have you?
I’m 6’3″ so I don’t attract much aggro (touch wood). I avoid trouble because fighting is brainless, but I like to think I could look after myself. I’ve only physically confronted anyone twice in over ten years – and on both occasions it was because they were upsetting women.
8 Has anyone in your family ever done anything creative for a living?
Yes, we have one artist, one movie cameraman, a graphic designer and a furniture designer in our family.
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Newmania – a technical hitch prevented me from adding that I was about 10 yrs old at the time. We bought candles and lacked for nothing. We were in no danger.
War was not fun. Even the gulf war and the Falklands in which my brother-in-law served. The only fun bit I can remember was my sister reading about the exploits of her husbands ship when he was actually sat beside her and the ship was docked in Plymouth. But of course if it’s in the paper, it must be true.
Tayles – a true gentleman.
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How interesting !!! Don`t why I put the fighting one in , not my bag at all. Although I am just the right size to be punched ( and the right volume) so I have been obliged to run away a bit ..long ago now. I was trying to think of markers that were not economic and preferably funny or quirky. I was also trying to imply a point that class is important and in England , hard to escape . A case for some limited social engineering ..GASP!!! Has he gone Toynbee crazy head crackers ?
.Socialists are not all Blairs who just want a nice job and a big shiny picture of themselves everywhere .Whatever it has become ; some of the wishes of British Socialist were admirable. Dennis Potter ,a playwright from what I think of as the great days of the BBC said this ,and I have often felt the truth of it . You have to imagine his rasping venomous and slightly camp delivery…
” After he war everyone came home we made a land fit for heroes . We set up the NHS and the welfare state … Ever since then it has all got shittier and shittier and shittier….” …I know what he means .. (I can`t check the exact words by the way )
TAYLES and FLO I really loved both your efforts . Don`t know how revealing it is although highly suggestive . JAQ is Tayles a modern Knightly ?
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FLO Your birthday !! I missed it , sorry , happy birthday . I also like your contributions and I’ve been please to see you in evidence a bit more of late . I `m also pleased to see that the light dusting of Liberalism seem to be fading and absolutely agree with you about Clarke . Creep.
XXXXX Cheers hic hic
TAYLES – That terrifically snarling post of yours on the middle-class ambivalence towards allowing opportunity to others is about one thing really . Downward-mobility.
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Newmania – Knightly as in Emma? Ooh I dunno, I hope so. But as such a delicately built little thing I would find someone 6’3″ very intimidating. Even if they were the perfect gentleman. I suppose you just can’t get away from your history and the effect that some packages have on you regardless of content. I wonder if before the media was image driven whether we listened to the political message more and whether now a certain image is all? Height, looks, hair, voice. If Satan and JC suddenly appeared, Satan would be handsome in a sharp suit and JC would undoubtedly be sectioned immediatly. I found the Polly/Churchill comparison astonishing. What politicians would fail do you think, if they were around today? (and why?)
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Yes Knightley from Emma JAQ , and who says that JC should not have been sectioned ? I think he was honestly mistaken myself (on the parentage front).
I find your comments on Tayles highly amusing by the way but I`ll spare your blushes…wee delicate thing!!
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Much of the problem with Cameron’s programme of making the Tories look nice is that it is aimed not at the population as a whole but at the the Guardian reading, organic eating chattering classes. Firstly I don’t think those are ever going to more than flirt with the Tories but more importantly the Guardian does not sell to a fraction as many voters as the Sun.
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Neil Craig – good point.
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Newmania – thankyou
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If Satan and JC suddenly appeared, Satan would be handsome in a sharp suit and JC would undoubtedly be sectioned immediatly (Jaq)
Forgive me if I’ve asked this before: Where would Labour be if Blair was an ugly git with rotting teeth? (and before you say he is, some women allegedly swoon over him).
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I refuse to believe there are women so lost to humanity that they “swoon ” over Tony Blair. Politicians are rarely attractive though are they . I mean , I hear Boris this and Boris that but he looks like a butter Coloured Telly Tubby to me (is it La la ?). I must admit the leader of the Islington Labour Party is a bottle of hot daddies sauce and she always smirks at me as she sweep past on her way into the Town hall for some diabolical purpose. Fortunately I do not believe there can be love across such a divide .Montague and Capulet is one thing but the damned ; lefties quite another. Is there a drama in this
She meant to steal from the leaseholders , but she stole his true blue heart …….
Naaaah …..
.
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Thanks for the belateds, Newmania, it was one of my least enjoyable birthdays courtesy of Clark and Toynbee.
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‘I `m also pleased to see that the light dusting of Liberalism seem to be fading…’ (newmania)
Not so fast, I didn’t suggest that. I’ll always be an old style Liberal culturally. Love my freedom, civil libs and individuality too much, so too much of a rebel to be otherwise. That’s why, like so many others, I believe, I voted for the Liberals. Though I was always half-hearted about the Lib Dems, they were and are far too into Socialist control freakery and I began to lose faith in the EU and their adoration of it.
Economically, I’ve never been a Liberal extremist, never a Thatcherite.
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Much of the problem with Cameron’s programme…it’s aimed at the Guardian reading, organic eating chattering classes…I don’t think those are ever going to more than flirt with the Tories but more importantly the Guardian does not sell to a fraction as many voters as the Sun. (Neil Craig)
Exactly!
Do you know that 8 MILLION people read the Sun and over 3 million of them buy it. How many buy the Guardian, 3-400,000?
The Guardian lost a lot of Liberal supporters from among it’s readers readers, well, they lost me, over their backing for the illegal invasion of Iraq and Toynbee’s sickening ‘put a peg on your nose and vote Labour’ campaign. Liberals like me who took part in the Guardian embargo will never forget Toynbee and the Guargian’s apologetics for warmonger Blair.
In respect of the past three elections, it largely was ‘the Sun wot won it!’
Cameron’s gambling a heck of a lot on winning over, say, a 130,000 Guardian reading Labour supporter in Labour marginals. Even if the lot of them vote for him, it won’t be anywhere near enough.
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PaulD said:
Where would Labour be if Blair was an ugly git with rotting teeth? (and before you say he is, some women allegedly swoon over him).
You’re right, paul, a friend of mine asked me to please not criticise Blair in her presence as she’s ‘in love with him’. No accounting for taste, is there?
Where Cameron has to be careful is that the basis of his attraction for many women is that we see him as the antidote to Blair, the saviour of democracy, free speech and civil liberties. He’s taking a huge risk in associating himself with Toynbee and her control freaked, Blair/Brown views. I’m back on the fence again, thanks to this and it’s one mighty crowded fence. The next poll results
will be interesting.
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Flo – Cameron isn`t just winning Guardian readers. Its public sector employees that are the key and the electoral key is the regionalisation of the vote.
I do very much sympathise with your view though. I usually feel the same
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Its public sector employees that are the key and the electoral key is the regionalisation of the vote. (newmania)
Only a very small fraction of the 5 million or so public sector ARE
guardian readers, largely the white collar professionals – and they’re included in my 130,000 in the Labour marginals.
Which newspaper do you think huge chunk of the other 4.8 million public sector read?
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FLO
Well it is your assumption that David C only appeals to Guardian Readers, if I understand you rightly. This has clearly not been the case thus far ..or has it ? Why do you say so and where does your 130,000 figure come from ?
Public sector workers are important because the main argument with the Neo Con right of the party is on tax cuts. To them that reads job cuts . The big issue for popular Conservatism would be immigration which I think Cameron is wise to leave myself .
What would you be telling the team to do differently Flo. What policies or policy ideas would you want floated .? Lets say you are leader of the Conservative Party what would you say to the press tomorrow about the new direction Auntie Flo was taking us in ?
BTW I have just read some of the Boris articles on Blair prior to his first election win . There is a strange mirrored resonance with DC now Even Boris went a bit Blairy eyed at one point .(As did I). I had forgotten how “right wing” he appeared then.
Insomnia strikes………………..
Flo as PM now that would be fun . JAQ as Home secretary ,a firm hand , K, I think gets the treasury Idlex Sport and culture and media ,Leader of the House would be Mel and I `m giving Steven L Foreign Affairs .(He would genuinely be more respected than the current one). Paul D can have rural affairs …he will be disappointed, I know. Tayles will be ruthlessly excluded leaving free to prowl menacingly on the back benches. Captain Badger gets Lord Chief whip and Captain of Gentleman at arms. I `ll be the fat bloke who doesn1t do anything but somehow still hangs around getting a fat wad and run of the typists . Oh Mark Gamon gets shunted into the Lords …
Can`t please everyone
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Thanks for that, Newmania. I’ve never had a rural affair before.
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Prowling menacingly? Like the sound of it. Let’s face it, I’m too outspoken to get a front bench position. Always been my problem – I want to thrash out the truth when others are happy to form a cosy compromise. Oh well, the Dennis Skinner of the Tory back benches it is.
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May I suggest Jack Ramsey as minister for women given that the education post is taken? And I see you didn’t appoint idlex as minister for children, perhaps Tayles would like control of the Olympics?
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You’re right – Newmania’s choices are the best.
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I’ve never had a rural affair before………….
CHERIE – Thats a lie !
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I live in a west london apartment building and absolutely love it despite the fact that there isn’t a lot of space. The thing is–its beautiful and the parks are beautiful and even the people who live around here are pretty attractive. I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with apartment living as long as you have good parks as long as the apartment is stylish and a pleasure to live in.
Long commutes make life utterly impossible. What people don’t like is an ugly apartment with paper thin walls and vicious neighbours with bad taste in clothes. If on top of that they have to take on a huge mortgage to pay for the privilage of this hell life must all seem a bit hopeless.
What I want to know is why need these apartments be ugly?
And why aren’t one’s neighbours a pleasure and a joy to be near?
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Charlotte – I cannot agree with you more.
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>Flo as PM now that would be fun . JAQ as Home secretary ,a firm hand , K, I think gets the treasury Idlex Sport and culture and media ,Leader of the House would be Mel and I `m giving Steven L Foreign Affairs .(He would genuinely be more respected than the current one). Paul D can have rural affairs …he will be disappointed, I know. Tayles will be ruthlessly excluded leaving free to prowl menacingly on the back benches. Captain Badger gets Lord Chief whip and Captain of Gentleman at arms. I `ll be the fat bloke who doesn1t do anything but somehow still hangs around getting a fat wad and run of the typists . Oh Mark Gamon gets shunted into the Lords …
Can`t please everyone
——————
Newmania
What a hoot – love the Leader of the House idea, I’d spend all day chatting up everyone in the Tea Room and as I’m an old hand I’d know all there is to know and be able to help steer everyone the right way
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What do we call our new party?
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The Multicoloured/Multi-dimensional all singing and dancing Party
or
Kaleidoscope
or
Polychromatic Party
the slogans would be
“The facts of life are kaleidoscopic”
“Vote for change, vote for a new dimension”
Well, Steven_L – any more ideas?
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Well if I had anything to do with it wouldn’t be called Kaleidoscopic or anything else implying that a wide range of cultures can be tolerated as equals in one country. It would be called mono-scopic if anything . The kaleidoscopic experiment has failed .
As David Cameron has called himself a “Liberal Conservative” if it was my party following the time honoured nomenclature I would call it either “The Real Conservative Party” or ” Conservative Continuity “.I`d like to get nationalism in there and a sense of concern for the working class as well, so maybe the Nationalist Socialist Conservative Party ?I `m thinking some sort of catchy shortening a cool symbol , some tasty uniforms in black ………
The very first order of the day is to purge the cabinet of Kaleidoscopicists who were merely pawns to sweeten the accession. Following a scandal ,( grainy photos ,a farm yard animal). Mel resigns suddenly before mysteriously contracting radiation sickness. This leaves only Flo standing in my way. By working whithin the party committee by committee I acquire influence . About this time we adopt th symbol of the clunking fist or clenched on the scrawny neck of Polly Toynbee. Looks good at the torchlight parades. Flo dies suddenly .
We turn our hungry eyes to the soft underbelly of Europe. Steven L unveils the new army in a march past of terrifying intent .
The world respects this country once more
Jon done
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Can I join in?
The YOUNG Conservatives?
The Contrarians?
The Hedonics?
The Hecatombs?
The Soc Cons?
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Newmaina – I’m sorry, I won’t have Flo dying suddenly under any circumstances. Please re-jig immediately
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Newmania
As you are the fat cat in this regime I would have to agree totally and be held under Cabinet secrecy
ps yes Jaq, no deaths
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.. I `m looking forward to Flo`s real suggestions if she can be bothered. I don`t really want black uniforms and god knows what Steven L would do with a new army.
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Idlex Sport and culture and media (newmania)
That’s very kind of you, newmania. I’m already working on my policies.
First, sport. My immediate impulse is to completely ban it. But on further reflection I think I would prefer to simply ban athletics, and withdraw from the Olympics. There is nothing more tiresome than to watch than a lot of people running round and round in circles – except perhaps to oneself run round and round in circles.
As for other sports, I’m inclined to change the status of the ancient rain-making ceremony of cricket from a sport to a religion – thus transferring it to another government department.
In respect of rugby football, I would require the use of a spherical ball rather than the large fat sausage they currently use. And I would forbid any handling of the ball. And I would require that points only be scored by kicking the ball under the bar, rather than over it. In this manner I would reunite rugby football with association football (soccer), and thereby end the confusion of what is meant by ‘football’.
And then I would de-professionalise football (and indeed all sports), and restore it to its ancient amateur status. And at the same time I would require free admission to all sports venues (this last will be a big vote winner).
And finally, I would have written above the gates of every stadium, in large capital letters: GET REAL! IT’S ONLY A GAME!!
Now, culture…
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I think you might have made a better stab of the England Rugby coaching position than Robinson Idlex and you could hardly hurt the cricket .
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‘so maybe the Nationalist Socialist Conservative Party?’ (newmania)
I’d rather call it the National Socialist Democratic European Workers Party. Like any national socialist party we need a scapegoat, and I suggest the French.
We could swell the ranks of my army with strapping young East Europeans. We could blame their poverty on the French appeasement of Hitler and French inability to defend their country against the Nazis.
‘Even now how hardworking European Workers like you are suffering for French inadequacy. You toil 12 hours a day in British fields and pay taxes to subsidise the rich and lazy farmers of France.’
Riling them all up against the French should be easy, after all France wouldn’t even let East Europeans work there after the accession. Then we train them, arm them and invade France, simple.
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Newmaniac stands, gloating over Flo’s stricken corpse, his twisted frame shaking with the vile force of the half crazed evil that’s driven him for so long.
“All mine…ALL MINE! D’you hear me Flo’? It’s all mine! I warned you, but you laughed. You scoffed at me every time I said I’d beat you and your puny Bushmen. Now you’ve paid the price. Bring me wine you oafs, I want to celebrate my conquest of UK”, Newmaniac screams, laughing manically.
A frighted young serf rushes in and offers to pour Newmaniac a glass of wine from the flagon he carries. Newmaniac grasps the flagon, brutally clubs the trembling young man aside with his staff and greedily quaffs, ignoring the bloody rivulets that stream down his power crazed face and neck.
“Blair, Cameron, Auntie Flo’, I beat them all. Today Flo’. tomorrow the world!”
So engulfed with the flush of his victory is Newmaniac, that he’s slow to notice the pungent scent of lions beginning to fill the air of his fetid chamber… until he suddenly quizzically sniffs…..”What the….?
“Don’t move too quickly, Newmaniac, you’re safe…for a time…as long as you keep still.”
“FLO’! You! B-u-u-ut how…?”, Newmaniac stammers, as his bent frame, writhes around until he faces the open jaw of a magnificent male lion.
“Aieeeeeeeeeeeeeee! No, please Flo’, I’ll do anything, anything, save me, please Flo’, let me die like a man, not like a piece of meat.”
Smiling serenely, Flo’ hessiates, then turns to her tribe of Bushmen, their glinting spears held aloft just inches from Newmaniac’s bent and trembling frame.
We’re a free democracy, Bushmen, no evil can ever subvert that forever. So, what do you say, shall we save Newmaniac….or let the lion have him?”
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Flo flo flo …I laughed and laughed and laughed…oh lord and the bushmen come and save the day its priceless.
Bravo I `ll remember that for a long time .Just seen the new Bond (good), this is a bit more old style
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Steven L- Bring me back some nice soft cheese and fois gras old chap.
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“One last request before I’m cat meat, Flo”, whined Newmaniac.
“I poisoned you, manacled you, tied you up in a sack, stabbed you, drowned you, then strangled you just to be sure. No one could have survived al of that, you’re a zombie, aren’t you? Make a dying man’s wish come true and tell me before I snuff it that you’re not really Flo’. I did beat her this time, didn’t I?”,asked Newmania.
“Of course she’s Flo’”, said the lion, affectionately licking Flo’s cheek, with his great rasping tongue.
“Not so hard, Aslan”, Flo’ squealed, pulling her face away….but it was too late. Flo’s face had split in two and hung droopily either side of Aslan’s mouth. All that was left was a sputtering lump of blubber…which somehow seemed strangely familiar to Newmania.
Newmania gazed, horrified, at the blubber. “It’s not YOU, under all of that muck, is it?”, asked Newmania, squinting at the artificial mess of rubber filler, glue and hair before him.
“Of course, it’s me”, snapped the whinging lump of blubber, grumbling to itself and spitting strings of glue and Polly Filla with every word it spoke. And this should be your classic denouement, Newmania, for all of that rubbish you’ve written about me. Oh, and let me correct you, it wasn’t you who did for Flo’ either, you couldn’t push the skin off a rice pudding. Flo’ survived alright, so I finished her off. But how can I do for you now too while I’m like this? Aslan, down boy, forget Newmania, I need a bath first, let’s go”, said Polly, grabbing her decoy bath duck.
“Not so fast”, said Aslan, hooking Polly Filla back with his great claws…hmmm… aren’t you the one who wrote that a sickbag is needed for Disney’s new epic about Aslan and Narnia? Tell me, Polly Filla, what exactly did you do to my friend Flo’…..?”
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aaawwwww a happy ending you old softy .Can you feel the love tonight !!!Don`t know if CS Lewis would find it doctrinally pure exactly and Polly Filler has got to taste like crap.
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I do like your shadow, shadow Cabinet idea, Newmania, though I think Boris should be PM of this. I’d like to be Secretary of State for Heritage. First thing I’d do is shame the French into leaving our war graves alone, tighten up the regulations on Listed properties and slap Listings on all of our graves and graveyards, stop any encroachment on our villages and anything but sympathetic developments in these, stop all of this development in the South East and no more runways.
Jaq, thank you so much for taking newmania to task for killing me.
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You’re welcome Flo – I am fearless!
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Idlex – Not sure about your deprofessionalisation (is that a word?) of sport. You’d end up with all the talent abroad and the likes of me playing for Chelsea. Not a nice thought.
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Flo – can’t remember if you gave me this Polly link but there were some interesting comments.
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You’d end up with all the talent abroad (Tayles)
Quite the opposite. At present, more or less any good player from Brazil ends up playing for some European club, rather than in their own country. So professional sport impoverishes Brazil, all the talent having gone abroad.
At the same time, this process acts to crush the aspirations of young British or European football players, who have a much reduced chance of playing for clubs like Chelsea when half the team comes from abroad.
I used to live in Brazil, and they play football for the pleasure of it (something more or less entirely lost in Britain). The Peles and Ronaldos of Brazil grew up kicking balls around for fun on streets and beaches and back yards, and developed their skills there. When do you ever see this happening in England? It’s probably illegal, anyway, like everything else. And it entirely explains the dearth of once-abundant English football talent.
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Flo – last of the links but I had to draw your attention to this one. In ‘The alternative manifesto’ story it’s important to follow the ‘Here’s a post’ link in the last paragraph.
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