Monday
I love August! So exciting. Dave is in totally secret location in Corfu. Only Jed and an agency snapper know the details. This is part of brilliant ‘deflection’ strategy. If anything goes wrong, e.g., shad. cab. split on Middle East erupts, we roll out pics of Dave in O’Neill surf shorts. Genius! If row really bad — e.g., Foxy manages to work out we’ve put a bar on his mobile phone to stop him calling journalists — we have pics of Dave with trunks slightly falling down. I hope it won’t come to that. Poor Dave, the things he does for the Cause. Even though he’s by a pool with his mates from ‘Bully’ — not sure what this means, can’t be about darts surely? — he conducts big conference call on Lebanon. Maureen on switchboard does brilliant job holding up William long enough for Dave to agree line with Jed first. It’s the little people who keep things ticking over, you know.
Tuesday
Have thought of one — a policy, I mean! Was riding Sesame when it came to me. Inspired by recent announcements, especially Hugo Swire and Eric Pickles’s ‘Save the Great British Holiday’ — handing out lollies and campaign postcards from an ice-cream van (brilliant!) — it occurred to me that what Dave really wants are groundbreaking ideas expressed in simple terms that ordinary people can understand. So, having gone home early to skive, it suddenly hit me: why not say that under a Tory government we will all work less?! We could have a 35-hour week, like the Frogs. Pas difficile! It ticks so many boxes: General Well Being, standing up to Big Business (boo! hiss!), being quite nice about EU as part of our rebranding exercise (Operation Amnesia). Tell Nigel my idea. He calls Jed over and makes me explain it again. Then Jed says, ‘Write me a memo’. Am policy wonk!
Wednesday
Spend entire day trying to organise pulping of our ‘So You Want to Be Mayor of London’ information packs with novelty stickers, list of sleaze-free donors and a welcome message from Dave. Can’t believe we produced 10,000. Such a waste of good fridge magnets.
Lot of ‘candidates’ jolly cross at postponement. Lovely Mr Boles insisting we brief that he never wanted to be Mayor anyway and only entered race to save his mate Dave from humiliation. Not sure how we would phrase this. Was bad enough trying to brief that Adam Rickitt was never on the A list, and is not even a Tory. Ask Mr Boles if he’d like me to send him an information pack anyway, just in case he changes his mind. He says: ‘Er, well, yes, go on then,’ in v. deep, cross voice.
Thursday
Fully fledged briefing paper on the possibilities of 35-hour working week now sitting on everyone’s desk. Am so proud I make huge error: ring M at his desk in Commons to boast. He says: ‘This is ******* brilliant! You know what the headline is don’t you? “Dave makes policy on the hoof”! Geddit!?’ Says he’s going to sit on the story for a bit. ‘Save it for the depths of August, once we’re done tailing Madge Beckett in her caravan.’
I think, in the process of trying to impress my beau, I may have just briefed against the Great Leader. This is too much to bear. Things can only get better. Can’t they?
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