DIARY
PETER PRESTON
W
hat have you done to this Johnson fellow?' asked my dad among the vitupera- tive volcanoes of last winter. Dunno,' I said, absolutely genuinely. But now the per- plexity grows. 'The Guardian is my favourite morning paper,' writes Paul. 'Of the six or seven I buy each day, it is the one I turn to most eagerly, if only to work myself into a healthy morning rage.' We're happy to be of service, though I always thought the admirable and saintly Marigold Johnson — as she once told me, husband glowering — was the real Guardian reader in that household. (Surely they can't buy two?) Anyway, this bizarre testimonial removes all trace of Paul, however choleric- cathartic, from my private pin-sticking-effi- gy list — leaving Stephen Glover in splen- did isolation. How does he do it week after week? Are the media (see Greer and Burchill) really, as he writes, too 'self- absorbed'? This from a chap who turned Andreas Whittam Smith into King Lear. Perhaps, as Andy Warhol Smith might have said, everyone should edit a Sunday news- paper for 15 minutes; and then shut up about it.
The Select Committee on Members' Interests inquiry into Mr Neil Hamilton's stay at the Ritz was probably always going to be a small, damp, long-winded eruption before the committee itself became extinct: ten meetings and almost eight months to end in acrimonious nothingness. Well, as my learned friends would say, let that pass. But there is one thing in the finality of the report that makes you harrumph out loud. Mr Hamilton sat a couple of feet behind me throughout my patch of summoned evi- dence last February. I had absolutely no access to what he said in return. Actually, he didn't say anything: he wrote a series of letters, one of which cites evidence of the `lavish hospitality' I `no doubt' must have enjoyed in the last 12 months. `Mr Preston and his wife were guests of Barclays Bank at the Men's Finals at the champagne lunch and tea — at a cost of thousands of pounds in all.' True, all true. But who can have snitched so comprehensively? Surely not our fellow table guests at the same occa- sion, a Mr and Mrs Neil Hamilton.
It's the first time in ten years I've been inside British Gas headquarters on that sui- cide corner by Vauxhall Bridge, and they sure as eggs haven't spent their privatised billions on corporate topshow. Sleeves (with slightly fraying cuffs) are rolled up around here. This is still a family of an industry where you're hired young and menial, and work your way up. The reviled Cedric Brown joined the East Midlands Gas Board over 40 years ago as a 'pupil dis- tribution engineer' straight from Derby College of Technology — before catapult- ing to glory as an assistant engineer for Tunbridge Wells Borough Council. Not remotely the greedy wide-boy's fast track to ultimate riches. I don't think he's in it for the money. I think the money, arriving late with added politics, has been more of an under-advised botch which chairman Gior- dano and PR king Sanguinetti ought to be kicked around for first — because they don't build the pipelines or take the risks. But I also think that Labour ought to be a bit calmer on the percentage-rise horror front. One of the great figures of post-war British industry was the last Gas chairman but two, Denis Rooke. He built British Gas; he welded it together; he memorably, heedlessly, bullishly saw off sticky Tory politicians like Nigel Lawson who wanted to mess in his patch. At the moment of pri- vatisation nine years ago, Rooke was paid £73,000, perhaps then a third of the going rate in the private sector. But unlike other nationalised industry bosses of the era, who often seemed to me to do little but mange greyly about their awful, parsimonious exis- tences, Denis was all get up and go. 'Gas is exciting, vibrant stuff' — an unlikely verdict `My wallet's in the glove compartment.' delivered with brio. He was worth a hell of a sight more than we paid him. Gordon Brown ought, at least, to remember that sometimes the original nationalised pay fig- ure which yields the eye-popping percent- age increase was a bad joke to begin with.
I've been to Paris, to speak at a confer- ence. Easily done, except that this time for boring reasons — I have to fly, leaving the car at Heathrow. That's a prudent hour of driving from South London, a desperate- ly tight (as it happens) extra 30 minutes for long-term parking, and another hour to check in and board. The flying time is 45 minutes, but add 30 more for runway frig- ging about, 45 for disembarking and wait- ing for the bag, plus 55 minutes from Charles de Gaulle. Five hours, door to fraz- zled door. Coming back is ten minutes worse, largely because Air France appears to be tackling the French unemployment crisis single-handed by having three bad- tempered ladies check your passport every five yards. I have, with a following wind, driven to Paris faster than that. I can cer- tainly shave 30 minutes off the time by train, and could pocket another 20, if Eurostar weren't so mystifyingly keen on sub-airport punctuality. Even so, that's the last flight to Paris willingly incurred. Sir Alastair Morton, Britain's most belligerent businessman, ought to be beaming from ear to ear. If he can get the trains running sweetly through his Tunnel, the advantage in time and hassle needs no advertising. Perhaps, for a while, he might concentrate on being nice to newspapermen — rather than hanging them and their hapless edi- tors out to dry in a hailstorm of undeleted expletives. Could love him; would love to love his service.
Still, one way or another, the Brits seem to be managing to get to Paris in ever- increasing numbers. I wait at a café table in the Rue Jacob, head hunched over a news- paper in case of recognition. (The last time I sat at a similar table 50 yards away, it got reported in the Independent.) The milling mob of summer St Germain isn't remotely French. It speaks Surbiton, dresses Sur- biton, sports (male) Surbiton knobbly knees in old M & S shorts. The Left Bank has turned, in a trice, into London-sur- Seine. The Latin Quarter is the English Quarter. Even the old restaurants are struggling to respond. Once upon a time, on a Manchester menu, I came across 'veal cordon blur'. Now the little Rue Jacob steakhouse which used to repel all tourists has provided the perfect complementary pud — lute aux pommes', helpfully trans- lated, 'thin appeal pie'.
Previous page
