At least six cheers for Barry Sheerman, Labour MP for Huddersfield, with his splendidly English reaction to reports that Roman Catholic bishops in England are trying to insist that state-funded Catholic schools should teach Catholic doctrine (including condemnation of abortion, contraception, same-sex partnerships, etc.) and stay clear of such banned activities as sex education. According to The Observer on 30 December 2007, –
Barry Sheerman, chairman of the parliamentary cross-party committee on children, schools and families, said he …. felt that behind the scenes there was 'intense turmoil' about the future of Catholic education. 'A group of bishops appear to be taking a much firmer line and I think it would be useful to call representatives of the Catholic church in front of the committee to find out what is going on,' he said. 'It seems to me that faith education works all right as long as people are not that serious about their faith. But as soon as there is a more doctrinaire attitude questions have to be asked. It does become worrying when you get a new push from more fundamentalist bishops. This is taxpayers' money after all.' [Emphasis added]
Mr Sheerman's interrogation of the RC bishops whom he proposes to summon to give an account of themselves to his parliamentary committee should be an event to remember.
Brian
The New Year Honours, rather oddly published on 29 December of the preceding year, are a treasure trove of British idiosyncrasy, but none more so than the list of those awarded the Royal Victorian Medal (RVM), one of the very few gongs in the personal gift of the Queen and her family:
Royal Victorian Medal
Lee Anthony Baldock chauffeur to the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall
Peter John Bourner sawmill manager, Sandringham estate
Constable Keith Andrew Chadband Metropolitan Police, services to royalty protection
Richard William Hubert Codman farm foreman, Sandringham estate
Nichola Colman public enterprises secretary, Sandringham estate
Lee Dobson head valet to the Prince of Wales
Rodney Arthur Frowhawk formerly tractor driver/agricultural engineer, Sandringham estate
Kenneth Giles night warder, state apartments, Kensington Palace
Frances May Hoare senior retail assistant, Windsor Castle
Elisabeth Mabel McInnes formerly flower arranger, Palace of Holyroodhouse
Barry John Mitford page of the backstairs
Geoffrey Peers formerly horticulturalist, Home Park, Windsor
Thomas Edward Trent yeoman warder/assistant ravenmaster, HM Tower of London
But the best of all has to be:
John Richard Henderson yeoman bed goer, the Queen’s bodyguard of the Yeomen of the Guard
Many intriguing questions are, if not begged, at least prompted by some of these honorands. Did Ms McInnes give up her job as flower arranger at the little used Palace of Holyrood House on reaching retirement age, or out of boredom, having (presumably) very little to do for around 50 weeks of the year? Or frustration at having her beautiful and innovative flower arrangements so often unseen by other humans? How did she while away the rest of the day after she had finished arranging the day's flowers? Come to that, what made Mr Frowhawk give up his demanding job as "tractor driver/agricultural engineer" at Sandringham? Reaching retirement age, or a personality disorder brought on by inability to 
decide whether he was a tractor driver or an agricultural engineer? We can guess how the gloriously titled 'assistant ravenmaster' at the Tower of London with the wonderful Shakespearian name ("Thomas Trent") earns his keep, and trust that his honour hasn't put the nose of his boss, the chief ravenmaster, out of joint: perhaps he already has an honour, preferably of slightly higher grade.
But top prize must go to Mr John Richard Henderson, yeoman bed goer, the Queen’s bodyguard of the Yeomen of the Guard. If that doesn't boggle the imagination, nothing will. The explanation in Wikipedia ("there are four divisions, First, Second, Third, and Fourth. Each has a Divisional Sergeant Major, Yeoman Bed Goer, Yeoman Bed Hanger, and 13 Yeomen") raises more equally delicious questions than it answers. No, I didn't make it up: you couldn't, could you?
Hat-tip: my wife, without whom, etc.
Brian
I seem to be alone in deploring the current clamour for deporting every last foreigner who has been convicted of any offence, however minor, and even where the sentencing judge has made no recommendation for deportation. Spokespersons for all three major political parties seem to be competing for the electoral prize for the harshest and most extreme deporter of Johnny Foreigner (presumably the BNP wants to deport them all anyway, whether or not they have been convicted of any offence). One minister has even spoken of her hopes of hitting a 'target' for the numbers of foreigners deported.
A resident of this country who happens to hold another country's passport, but has lived in Britain since early childhood and has no other home, perhaps married to a UK citizen and a parent of children who are UK citizens (who can't, of course, be deported), would suffer one of the most brutal punishments imaginable if deported after serving a few weeks' imprisonment for a quite minor offence. Yet our politicians seem bent on making deportation of offending aliens automatic, regardless of extenuating circumstances or the effects on the offender's family.
When a senior prison service official issued a moderately worded circular suggesting that there was no interest in deporting aliens sent to prison for less than two years, all hell broke loose, with accusations flying about to the effect that the prime minister's promise was being broken and that the country would be flooded with footpads, assassins and rapists if foreigners given shorter sentences than two years were not after all going to be deported. Officials hastily back-tracked:
Ms Homer, chief executive of the BIA [Border and Immigration Agency], played down the significance of the memo, saying it was in line with government policy – and offenders jailed for less than a year could still be deported if a court recommends it. She added: "The prime minister was categorical earlier this year that we are committed to the removal of foreign national prisoners who commit serious crimes in this country. "Nothing in this document changes that and, in fact, this year we have removed more foreign nationals than ever before. We have repeatedly said we will target the most dangerous first, which is why we are initially targeting those who have served more than 12 months."
Chris Huhne, almost elected leader of the Liberal Democrats and reputed to be more 'liberal' and radical than Nick Clegg who narrowly beat him for the job, was as savage in his condemnation as his Tory counterpart. The BBC's full account of the uproar is well worth reading.
Let's hope that we shall soon hear from Shami Chakrabarti, Director of Liberty, about this ugly manifestation of paranoid xenophobia — and, even better, from the courts, which will surely take a view on whether deporting an alien who has served a sentence for a minor offence, where there has been no court recommendation for deportation, is compatible with the offender's human rights under the Act and the Convention: is the punishment (for that's plainly what it is) proportionate to the offence? does deportation deprive him or her of the right to family life? is such a punishment, imposed by executive order without due process through the criminal courts, in breach of the right to a fair trial? The government will argue that the right to deport aliens under immigration laws and rules belongs by long tradition to the executive, but the courts have increasingly insisted that where an immigration act shades into punishment, the government must observe basic rules of equity and fairness, including those laid down ion the Human Rights Act. The sooner we get a court ruling on this shoddy and disreputable practice, the better.
This was the issue over which the hapless Charles Clarke lost his job and his career back in May 2006; his successors have obviously learned the lesson. Come back, David Blunkett, John Reid, Michael Howard: all is, apparently, forgiven! (Jack Straw needs no invitation to come back: crafty as an eel, he has never been away.)
Gordon Brown should be ashamed of himself for caving in to this cheap Daily-Mail-driven populism. In the immortal words of Joseph Welch, the US Army's lawyer, addressed to Senator McCarthy in 1953, "You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?"
Brian
For several reasons British diplomats and other officials involved in international affairs are less prone to writing and publishing their memoirs after they retire than the politicians. Politicians are likelier than officials to be driven by the desire to vindicate themselves and to polish their reputations in the eyes of future historians: diplomats generally prefer anonymity. Retired diplomats tend to be cagier than their former political masters about potentially harmful breaches of the Official Secrets Act and other breaches of past confidences that might still damage the national interest. Most (but not all) politicians flaunt bigger egos than most (but not all) diplomats. So there's a danger that the vast reservoir of knowledge of what really happened in the lifetimes of retired diplomats will die with them, creating a serious gap in the material available to researchers and historians. Oral history is one way of preserving at least some of that treasure.
A few years ago one such retired diplomat, Malcolm McBain, on his own initiative but with the encouragement of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, launched a British diplomatic oral history programme designed to capture the recollections of a wide range of retired diplomats, from the grey knights who formerly commanded the mighty embassies in Paris, Washington, Bonn or Berlin and Rome, down to the (perhaps less discreet) smaller fry from the more obscure diplomatic missions in faraway countries of whose peoples and their problems we may know nothing[1] but on which they once possessed precious expertise. Their recorded recollections and opinions not only provide often fascinating insights into the real background to great events as witnessed by people who played an active part in shaping them: they also frequently paint a unique and authentic picture of what diplomatic life at different levels is really like, something which historians yearn for — and which the BDOHP provides entirely free of charge.
Malcolm McBain is a former British ambassador to Madagascar who also saw service in Tripoli, New Delhi, Kenya, Thailand, Brunei and Texas — a splendidly varied background from which to oversee such a programme. He has been Director (originally Co-ordinator) of the British Diplomatic Oral History Programme since 1995. The programme was based at Leicester University from 1995 to '97, and in the Churchill Archives Centre, Churchill College, Cambridge, since 1997. Malcolm has kindly contributed this note on the programme:
The British Diplomatic Oral History Programme creates an opportunity for former British diplomats to record their experience of of significant events, including the formulation and execution of UK foreign policy. Contributors to the programme are interviewed, the interviews are taped and transcribed, agreed with the interviewee, cleared with the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, and placed in the Churchill Archives at Churchill College, Cambridge. They can be read on and downloaded from the Churchill College website. Look at that website to see some of the existing contributions.
The British oral history programme is similar to a much bigger program in the United States which has generously shared its experience of oral history techniques, as well as giving much encouragement. British foreign policy is obviously less important in terms of shaping world events than it was in the 19th century. But it is still naturally very important to Britain as we come to assess the constantly changing kaleidoscope of events. The computer and email make current events more difficult for historians to unravel. The tendency of prime ministers to walk straight into 10 Downing Street at a young age with no previous experience of government office is another complication that tends to make oral history accounts by senior officials more valuable, rather than less. If oral history accounts show that a prime minister has taken decisions off the cuff without due diligence having been provided by officials in a position to give sound advice, then historians should know about it, if only with a view to avoiding such situtions in future.
The pendulum will no doubt swing back. Who knows what triumphs and disasters beckon before it does? The BDOHP seeks to chart the course of key negotiations and events before the collective memory is overtaken by a disorganised rabble of ephemeral trivia.
If you are a former diplomat or other official involved in international affairs, and have relevant recollections and views to contribute, please consider contributing them to the BDOHP. The programme is voluntary and needs charitable donations. We also need more interviewers and transcribers. Please contact the director of the programme, Malcolm McBain, at m.mcb@uwclub.net or by telephone to 01722 417314.
To those properly suspicious readers who might fear that prior clearance of these oral history transcripts by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office means the excision by heavy-handed censors of most of their more interesting revelations, I would only say that I have been pleasantly surprised by the amount of controversial and sensitive material — both factual and by way of opinion — that have been cleared for placing in the archives and made publicly available to historians and researchers. My own contribution, for what it's worth, escaped any censors' blue pencilling at all, although I didn't try to pull my punches. More and more of this material is being provided on the Churchill archives website and it makes for fascinating and often surprising reading. We, and future historians, owe a large debt to Malcolm McBain, as well as to Churchill College Cambridge. Keep up the good work, Malcolm!
PS: I should declare an indirect interest: my wife was one of the early interviewers, and in my wholly prejudiced and predictable opinion, one of the best of them. (But someone else more personally impartial conducted the interview with me: the distinguished Director of the programme himself, no less.)
[1] "How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas masks here because of a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing." Neville Chamberlain, September 27, 1938, Parliamentary Debates, House of Commons (London: HMSO, 1938) vol. 339, 12th vol. of session 1937-1938, pp. 361-369, 373. [Quoted at http://www.historyguide.org/europe/munich.html.] Notice that, contrary to the common misquotation, Chamberlain did not refer to the country itself (Czechoslovakia) as one "of which we know nothing", but to the quarrelling people of it. Unfortunately Mr Chamberlain was not among the contributors to the Diplomatic Oral History Programme.
Brian
As the good ship Kosovo, piloted by Washington and London, heads for the rocks, students required to write about it, and teachers required to teach it, might benefit from reading (and copying out) a selection from these websites — with no apologies for the provenance of most of them:
http://www.barder.com/politics/international/kosovo/index.php
http://www.barder.com/politics/international/kosovo/littman.php
http://www.barder.com/politics/international/kosovo/littman2.php
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm199900/cmselect/cmfaff/28/2802.htm
http://www.barder.com/politics/international/denise/index.php
http://www.kosovo.mod.uk/rambouillet_text.htm
http://www.reliefweb.int/library/documents/thekosovoreport.htm
http://myfantazi.blogspot.com/2005/09/final-status-for-kosovo-untying.html
Acknowledgements in the form of trackbacks to this post will be appreciated; unacknowledged plagiarism only slightly less so. Happy browsing.
Brian
I'm sorry to come back to this so soon. But I don't really apologise for going into print yet again as another bloody Balkan conflict looms and our own government, along with the Americans and some others, shows every sign of trotting self-righteously towards the abyss. The Guardian of Saturday, 8 December 2007, generously published another in my series of Kosovo letters:
Russia remains the key to Kosovo
The Guardian, Saturday December 8, 2007Timothy Garton Ash (The best answer for Kosovo is EU membership, December 6) proposes a solution, EU-supervised independence by easy stages, which would reproduce the fatal flaw in Nato's strategy in 1999, ie the doomed attempt to impose a durable settlement strongly opposed by Russia and Serbia, two countries with vital interests in the region, one of them a security council permanent member able to veto any arrangement, thus depriving it of UN legitimacy.
Serbian forces were withdrawn from Kosovo in 1999 not as a result of any "Nato invasion" as Garton Ash suggests, nor of the bombing of Yugoslavia, but as part of a settlement achieved by the quiet diplomacy of the then Finnish president, Martti Ahtisaari, the US — and Russia. It was only when Russia backed new settlement proposals that the Serbs had no choice but to accept them. Any plan launched now without Russian (and consequently Serbian) consent and participation, and therefore without UN approval, will only promote further regional conflict, as well as setting a potential precedent for other secessionist movements demanding independence. More Balkanisation can't be the answer; nor can it be right for Nato to carve off an important part of a UN member state's territory without either its own or the UN's consent. Trying to bypass both Russia and the UN is a sure recipe for failure.
Brian Barder
London
I have already been reproached privately by an old friend for being purely negative in my Guardian letter. I would indeed have wished to add to the letter not just a positive alternative proposal but also a comment on the implication in Tim Garton-Ash's article that the EU exists to cure the ills of failed states in Europe and the near east by bestowing membership on them after imposing stiff democratic conditions. The effects on the EU itself of this high-minded recruitment drive are easy to see. Place-names such as Cyprus and Turkey come to mind. But any such additions would have made the letter much too long for any UK newspaper to consider publishing it.
The positive proposal that I (diffidently, as always) offer depends on the proposition that something akin to the status quo is less harmful to all concerned, including all the people of Kosovo, than the situation likely to result from a unilateral (and arguably illegal) declaration of independence by the Kosovo Albanians followed by recognition of their independence by some western governments, likely to include the UK and the US, but not all the rest of the EU, and certainly not including Serbia or Russia. The new self-proclaimed 'independent' state would stand no chance of acceptance for membership of the UN (because of the Russian and probably Chinese vetoes), its already shaky economy, hugely dependent on Serbia, would be at the mercy of Serbian sanctions, and the opportunity would probably be taken by (e.g.) the Serbian minority in Bosnia and several other secessionist groups in nearby countries to rack up their demands, on the principle of sauce being good for both goose and gander. The fate of the (now small) Serbian minority in Kosovo itself would be extremely precarious and armed intervention by Serbia, nominally or even genuinely to protect them, couldn't be ruled out. Is NATO really ready for an all-out land war with Serbia on such an issue?
What are the aims for an alternative outcome? A durable solution, which means a solution internationally and locally accepted, not regarded by anyone as perfect but simply as the least bad that can be devised, and capable of lasting unchallenged for a period of years. Complete internal autonomy for Kosovo just marginally short of full independence. A continuing international civil and police or military presence in Kosovo under UN auspices. Internationally monitored guarantees for the Serbian minority (what's left of it) in Kosovo, accepted and policed by Serbia and Russia among others. An international development aid programme for Kosovo. Institutional links (short of membership) for Kosovo with the UN and with the EU, formal institutional links with Albania and with the rest of Serbia. Perhaps a formal review of Kosovo's status by the Security Council five years from the inauguration of the new compromise settlement.
Nothing in this would appear to be inherently objectionable either to Russia or to the Serbs. No western interest would be damaged by it. The only party to the dispute that has so far rejected anything like it, as being short of full independence, is the Kosovo Albanians. The efforts of the EU and the US should be directed at persuading the Kosovo Albanians that it represents the least undesirable and the least dangerous solution for them as well as for everyone else. Everyone should stop trying to persuade Russia and the Serbs to agree to full recognised independence, a hopeless and ultimately irrational exercise. The first step should be to work out quietly with Moscow the just-short-of-independence outcome just outlined, and to leave it to the Russians to sell it, once agreed with them, to the Serbs (probably not a difficult task). The entire international community should then put it to the Kosovo Albanians that this is the best they can hope for; that it gives them all the substance that they want, and that all it's missing is the outward show; that a half-recognised or unrecognised self-declared independence would give them neither security, nor autonomy, nor prosperity, nor permanence. It should be made clear to them that if they agree to it, every effort possible will be made to meet all their legitimate concerns; but that if they continue to reject it, they will have the worst of all possible worlds — no recognition of any unilateral declaration of independence, no protection from Serbian hostility, no international recognition of their new status and no international guarantees of it. They will be in limbo. What better test of their political judgement and maturity?
But perhaps the first who would need to be persuaded would be the Americans, alas.
I have discussed some of the background to all this in a recent post, here.
PS: What on earth was that "NATO invasion" of Kosovo that Tim Garton Ash was writing about?
Brian
Although advised by a team of illustrious historians, the Channel 4 television programme Hitler's Favourite Royal, broadcast on 6 December 07, seems to have slipped up on a royal relationships banana-skin. The programme told the seamy story of Prince Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (Leopold Charles Edward George Albert; in German Carl Eduard, Herzog von Sachsen-Coburg und Gotha), Duke of Albany: a kind of proto-Prince Charles, although one hopes not politically. Someone has anonymously slipped me a copy of a polite but indignant message sent to one of the most prominent of the advisory historians:
You were listed as the lead historian on this interesting programme which was shown here, 6 December 2007, Channel 4.
It was a shame that early in the programme Charles Edward was described as a first cousin of George V, Kaiser William and Tsar Nicholas. It is such a common mistake to believe that these three monarchs were first cousins through descent from
Queen Victoria. In fact, as I am sure you know, George V and Tsar Nicholas were cousins, with an astonishing likeness, because their mothers were sisters, daughters of the King of Denmark. It was the Tsarina who was a first cousin of George V, Kaiser William and Charles Edward, Duke of Albany, because her mother was a daughter of Queen Victoria and therefore a sibling of Edward VII, The Empress Frederick, and The Duke of Albany. The false cousinship is mentioned so often in popular histories that people will begin to believe it. Many of the consultants on the programme should have picked up this mistake.A reference later in the programme to the Duchess of Albany as an 'English Princess' was also somewhat misleading. It is true that from the time of her marriage Helen of Waldeck lived in England and was a loyal member of her husband's family. But she was born the daughter of His Serene Highness, Prince George of Waldeck-Pyrmont and lived in Germany until her marrriage. One of her sisters was The Queen of Holland and another was married to King William of Wurttemberg. This
reference was a trivial point in the story of Charles Edward but a careless description can cast doubt on the veracity of other facts. And, in the same way, the fact that Charles Edward found himself Duke of Coburg must have been incomprehensible to anyone who did not already know that Victoria's husband, Prince Albert, was heir to his childless brother, the Duke. When Albert died in 1861 the Prince of Wales waived his right to inherit Coburg and passed the succession rights to his younger brothers. I think this could have been explained, however briefly.Nevertheless the programme had a lot to recommend it. Thank you.
To which the eminent historian courteously replied:
Thank you for your thoughtful and well-informed note. I believe you are correct on all counts. If I may, I'll pass on your comments to the filmmakers.
I hope that's clear?
Brian
Amid all the hysteria in the Westminster village over Mr Abrahams's donations to the Labour Party, some of them channelled through intermediaries ('proxies'), a number of questionable assumptions seem to have crept into the voluminous commentaries in the media. Here are ten statements, all of them reflected or implied in current newspaper and television stories and comments; the task is to pick out the one (and there seems to me to be only one) which is true, so far as we can tell from facts already made known:
1. It is an offence under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 to give money to a political party through an intermediary.
2. A political party is committing an offence under the Act by knowingly accepting money given through an intermediary.
3. A political party is committing an offence under the Act by accepting money given through an intermediary even if the recipient doesn't know at the time that the donor was acting as an intermediary for someone else.
3. Anyone who knows about a donation made through an intermediary and fails to report it is committing an offence.
4. An intermediary who allows himself or herself to be used as a channel for a donation to a political party of money which in fact comes from someone else is committing an offence.
5. The General Secretary of the Labour Party has admitted that he failed to report to the Electoral Commission certain donations, i.e. those received through intermediaries.
6. If the Labour Party's chief fund-raiser knew the true identity of the original donor of money given through intermediaries but did not report it to the Electoral Commission his omission amounts prima facie to an offence.
7. If the then General Secretary of the Labour Party knew the true identity of the original donor of money given through intermediaries but did not report it to the Electoral Commission his omission amounts prima facie to an offence.
8. If it were to emerge that Gordon Brown or Tony Blair knew at the time that some donations from Mr Abrahams (or anyone else) were being given to the party through intermediaries, and did nothing about it, that would be prima facie evidence of an offence under the Act.
9. Acceptance of money given direct by Mr Abrahams to any official of the Labour Party who knew that Abrahams was also making other donations through intermediaries would be an offence under the Act.
10. The facts already publicly revealed are enough to justify prosecuting Mr Abrahams under the Act.
I'm no lawyer (as others have drily pointed out in other contexts), and if I'm wrong in my belief that only one of these ten propositions is correct, I'll be glad to be corrected. On the other hand, if I'm right, the gravity of what has happened is being absurdly exaggerated — not least by Gordon Brown, with his initial expression of shock and horror, reactions then taken up with understandable glee by everyone else from David Cameron to the political commentariat and so on down to less exalted Labour ministers, vying with each other to express the profundity of their anguish or the extremity of their anger.
Anyone arriving today from Mars and reading the Sunday newspapers could be excused for assuming that the entire Labour cabinet except Gordon Brown had been convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, and that the hapless general secretary of the party had been arrested at Heathrow attempting to flee to Paraguay with a suitcase containing the entire war-chest of the Labour Party in cash. The facts so far revealed, if I understand them and the law correctly, actually reveal no more than a fairly minor omission in reporting by a single party official whose name hardly anyone knew until this whole thing blew up. Yet Mr Rawnsley of the Observer describes the situation as a swamp ("to all the other problems besetting the government we can add vicious division and recrimination about who is to blame for stranding them in this swamp") and "another sleaze eruption". He even goes so far as to add that "in one crucial respect this looks to be worse than cash for coronets": and the one crucial respect turns out to be nothing worse than that it will be easier to prove in this matter that an offence has been committed, and who committed it, than it was to prove that New Labour under Blair was dishing out peerages and knighthoods in exchange for massive donations to party funds. Our political morality yardsticks must have got badly bent if we are now to regard one offence as "worse" than another simply because it is more easily proved.
Let's try to remember that even if Mr Abrahams is a strange and probably rather unsavoury figure, all our political parties would be in deep trouble if they refused to accept money from the strange or the unsavoury; that Abrahams's uninhibited public revelations to both the Labour Party and to the media about his use of named individuals as intermediaries for some of his donations to the party can hardly be described as a failure of transparency; that there has been no suggestion that he has sought or been offered any kind of honour in exchange for his donations; that the party official who had been responsible for reporting the identity of the ultimate donor to the Electoral Commission resigned as soon as he realised that he had been required but had failed to do so — and issued a statement admitting his failure in detail; and that despite David Cameron's insinuation, under cover of parliamentary privilege, that Gordon Brown's personal integrity was now in question, not a splinter of evidence to support that accusation has so far been produced. Meanwhile, let's regard with appropriate derision all references to 'anonymous' or 'secret' donations, to 'sleaze' and to 'corruption'. A bad mistake was made by someone who ought to have known better, but that's hardly an indictment of an entire party or of an entire system. Calm down, dears, it's only a peccadillo!
I hope and believe that in six months' time Labour's lead in the opinion polls will have been restored and that when we try to remember what really happened about Mr Abrahams and his proxies, we shall wonder what all the fuss was about. But by then a serious economic downturn, verging on a recession, may well have transformed our political landscape out of all recognition. As a wise friend of mine remarked in a recent e-mail, vamos a ver. It's not over till it's over, or until the fat lady sings.
Oh, and won't you tell us the number of the sole proposition out of the ten above that's unquestionably true?
Brian
