There is worryingly little time left to make the appropriate preparations for Bridget Phillipson’s official birthday, on 19 December. As far as I am aware, no venue has been booked as yet – and given that the minister for women and incalculable self entitlement has her birthday slap bang in the middle of the festive season, finding a suitable place may prove problematic. The Royal Albert Hall, for example, is already booked out for an evening with Guy Barker’s Big Band Christmas, but I dare say that if pressure was brought to bear this could be junked so that the celebrations for Bridget’s 41st might be housed in a suitable location.
My suspicion is that he mixed up Azerbaijan with Azkaban from the Harry Potter books
Last year, if you remember, she was forced to slum it at the Hoare Memorial Hall, SW1, the bill being picked up by the Labour donor Lord Alli. It is hoped that he can be prevailed upon to fork out for the cost of spray-painting gold 100 naked Filipino dwarfs, who will be charged with the task of carrying her litter into the hall – but I am not sure that even this is in hand, let alone the various complex arrangements for the performing geese.
It may be that the government will be required to pass a law which enshrines the date of 19 December in the public mind and charges various ministries of state with the responsibility for organising this important commemorative event. A recourse to law does have some precedence – in 2013 a new law was enacted simply to ensure that Sir Keir Starmer didn’t have to pay any extra tax above £1 million on his pension, accrued when he was the Director of Public Prosecutions. It is to Sir Keir’s enormous credit that this canny little sliver of tax avoidance hasn’t engendered in him a sentimentality towards pensioners in general.
Either way, I hope the government takes my suggestion of legislation seriously: it is unconscionable that someone of Phillipson’s stature should be forced to spend both her official and unofficial birthdays eating pizza with members of her family.
I am also worried about the Deputy Prime Minister’s decision to hire a personal photographer on the paltry wage of £68,000 per annum. Perhaps she was worried that a much more considerable sum would have nettled the taxpayers, who pick up the bill. My concern is that this may be a short-sighted, if well-meaning, decision. The photographs of Ms Rayner must be of the very highest quality – and this is especially the case if there are to be what I believe are known as ‘growler shots’, as well as the more humdrum portraits of a fully clothed Angela condescending to members of the public. If much more intimate photography must be done – and frankly, I would warn against it – then you need someone behind the lens who displays a certain taste and elegance. No crass framing.
Ms Rayner is the first Deputy Prime Minister to demand a personal photographer and needs to set a precedent by hiring someone who is at the very peak of their profession. A Diego Velazquez or Hans Holbein of the camera – nothing less will do. Again, it is to Ms Rayner’s credit that while she once excoriated Boris Johnson, during his time as prime minister, for his use of ‘vanity photographers’, she has shown sufficient flexibility of mind to change her opinion by 180 degrees immediately upon taking office.
Incidentally, I intend to use this column to offer helpful advice to the new government on a weekly basis, much as I have done in those paragraphs above. It is always difficult for an incoming administration making that transition from opposition to governance with, all the while, political enemies sniping away. I am determined to take a much more constructive approach. And so, Sir Keir – we’ve got to talk about David Lammy. Now, there is nobody in the present administration for whom I have more respect. To have ascended with a second-class degree from one of the country’s worst universities, SOAS, to attain a place at Harvard is a remarkable and even mystifying achievement.
Further, for a person of colour to have succeeded in an organisation dedicated to keeping such folk as far from the levers of power as possible – by which I mean the Labour party – is to his immense credit. He now holds one of the great offices of state – he is our Foreign Secretary. And this is the problem because for one reason or another his grasp of geopolitics seems as slender as it was in 2008 when, appearing on ‘Celebrity’ Mastermind, he pronounced that the Rose Revolution had just taken place in Yugoslavia, a country which had ceased to exist almost two decades previously.
Indeed it was put to me by an American correspondent who had watched David’s performance in the USA that ‘he seems not to know anything about anything’. As evidence, one might cite his recent deep confusion over Azerbaijan’s bullying of Armenia or indeed his contention that the single most pressing and imminent international problem we face right now is global warming. My suspicion is that he mixed up Azerbaijan with Azkaban from the Harry Potter books, but clearly he needs some sort of short course in knowing what countries are where and what the people in them get up to, and whether we should like them or not.
It is not absolutely crucial to being foreign secretary – various American presidents have breezed through with only a slightly better grasp than David’s – but I think it would help to make the chap feel more secure when he is pontificating about foreign affairs to assorted journalists.
A day or two in front of an atlas and a few important places – Moscow, Washington, Beijing etc – scribbled down in a notebook would, I think, make a world of difference and boost his confidence. If he could do that before his next foreign assignment, so much the better.
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