Westminster corridors
There is, at present, a Tumult in the Town occasioned by the throwing of a Bag of Flour at our Gentle and Respected Home Secretary, Mr Woy (as in "Rol de la Reine") Jenkins during a recent meeting within the sound of Bow Bells. Mr Jenkins, as we all know, has never before visited any area near to Bow Bells (excepting, that is, a European trip to Paris during the last Ruffian Administration when it is reported that he met some most excellent Beaux Belles). But that is by the by.
Mr Jenkins cares greatly for flour. Was it not he (as Chancellor of the Exchequer) who once said "let them eat cake, so long as you give them not the wherewithal to bake it". This was then taken to mean that he proposed that the masses should instead use something known as the Falkender Easi-Blend Ersatz Cake Mix, for which invention one of the Fields (I believe it was "Lightfingers" Field) was later Knighted by a benign and cake loving Prime Minister? Again, I digress.
It seems now that when-the Boot (as Mr Reg Prentice insists on being called) is on the other Foot (as the Employment Secretary is known) then Flour Power is no longer fun. Mr Jenkins, in interviews in the Press (as well as The Thunderer), protests that Violence and Mob
Rule have taken over from Common Sense, Consensus Politics and the Rule of Law and Order.
For my part, I did not notice any discernible protest from the Home Secretary (when he was in Opposition) on two notable occasions when Parliamentary Democracy was seen at its best. I refer to events in the Parliament before last — and we all understand that Members of the Club are meant to set an example.
First, there was the memorable day when someone known as Bernadette Devlin rushed across the Chamber in the Club and punched a comitose Mr Reginald Maudling (a Secretary of State) on the nose. Did Mr Jenkins rise to defend Mr Maudling? Did he protest about violence and anarchists in the Club? No, he did not.
Secondly, and much more seriously, there was the even more memorable occasion when the Whigs voted with the Tories over trade union legislation to defeat a vote of censure proposed by the Ruffians. The leading Whig (if Mr John Pardoe will excuse the expression), a certain Mr Jeremy Thorpe, was villified and assaulted by the Left Wing Ruffians.
With Mr Thorpe on the floor and shouts of "yaroo, help, leggo" heard on all sides of the Chamber, did Mr Jenkins seek to assist the Whig Leader? Did he condemn those from his own Party who perpetrated the most dastardly and cowardly act of violence that it has been my misfortune to witness during all my years patrolling these Corridors? No, he did not. Yet, when a bag of Co-op Super Sifted hits him on the chest in East Ham, he blubs like a fourth-former about bullying, fagging and the like. Fie on it Mr Jenkins. Stand up like a man and be pelted. Take it on the chin (you have enough of them) and you may grow up to be half the politician that Mr Edward Heath, a fellow, traveller (mostly in the Americas), is.
The real question, of course, is: who wants Mr Prentice anyhow? The answer to that, I can now reveal, is the Duchess of Falkender. dissatisfied with her elevation to the Peerage ("I had more power when I was a common or garden secretary") she wishes to apply for membership of the Club and has set her sights on Mr Prentice's constituency (which has no slag-heaps in it — well, not as yet that is).
Mr Jenkins, we are told, will not be silenced by cowards on the Left and on the Right. By whom, then, will he be silenced? Certainly not by his followers of the "middle road", for they have no voices of their own. They, like Mr Jenkins, pretend that their fathers were not miners. They, like Mr Anthony Crosland, declare that they did not attend Public (or should I say Private) Schools. They sadly, are the faceless people of this Nation who are willing to countenance a Ruffian Administration, led by the worst Prime Minister in history (yes, you Mr Wilson) leading us all into the Abyss of self-delusion, lies and deceit.
Flour? Fiddlesticks. They deserve Fire and
Brimstone. Tom Puzzle
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