How long is a week in politics? (Or should that be a weak in politics?)

Haven’t posted for a few days. Been too busy watching from the sidelines as our glorious leader and his pox ridden government do a passable imitation of a collective hari-kiri (Have you got that mental image of John Prescott’s guts spilled out all over the place? Gaaaaghhh – Euro tripe mountain discovered in Hull, shock!)

The Blair 'tower of babble' is falling to earth faster than the price of a three-bedroom semi in Oil Sites Avenue, Hemel Hempstead. The joints have rotted away, the spun web of deceitfulness and the cement rendering mixed with purest bullshit is cracking and flaking. The edifice is crumbling to a mendacious dust.

Everywhere you look, the Blair regime is in flight. First team ‘Blair-nosers’, Reid, Jowell and Hewitt unmercifully slagged off by a Commons Select Committee for thinking of their own egos rather than the health of English bar staff workers. The Committee described their ‘compromise’ solution on smoking in pubs and restaurants as ‘bizarre and unworkable’ – and at odds with the rest of the UK who are instigating total bans within the next two years. The silence from the Glasgow pitbull is really quite deafening. (Maybe he's having a quiet drag round the back?)

The totally embarrassing, yet deeply satisfying spectacle of our very own ‘deep-throat’, Education Secretary of State, Ruth Kelly being intellectually stripped naked before the Education Commons Select Committee was something to see.

Boy, did they put the boot in? There she was squirming in her seat. Was it the hair shirt itching away under that twin-set ‘Opus Dei’ exterior? Did she get off on the masochistic martyrdom of it all? Watching it on the telly – it sure looked like she was a victim of Torqamada’s Spanish Inquisition, no mercy was being shown, Kelly looked like exactly what she is – a no talent lap dog with a weird religious bent (just like Blair)..... It was like she hadn’t been briefed, didn’t know what to say and hadn't read the script – she just wasn’t expecting it.….. But as Michael Palin once said in a Monty Python sketch, "NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition!"


Committee members prepare to give Ruth Kelly a damn good seeing to.

Then fatty Prescott just couldn’t keep it in any longer. Over the past few months, it’s clear that the Old Labour bile has been rising within Prezza’s twisted giblets. Glottal has been shooting up from the very bowels of Prezza’s pancreas, just there, next to that half digested meat 'n' tater pie scoffed in a hurry at that visit to 'MeatProdCo' last July. Something was bound to give. On Sunday it did. He blurted it all out, bits of carrot included, all over Tone and Ruth’s great Education experiment. Prezza’s not happy. He doesn’t like the prospect of selection in secondary education. After all, Prezza himself was a victim. Believe it or not, John Prescott failed the 11+, shock! That last statement has the same predictability value as ‘Bruce Forsythe wears toupee, shock’ and ‘Cherie Blair is a money grabbing opportunist after all, shock!


A small quantity of Prezza's Old Labour meat 'n' bile pies.

Even the arch Scottish Iago-creep that is Gordon Brown wasn’t immune from the ‘wheels coming off’ virus. It was great to see mega oil conglomerate Shell, deciding not to invest any more cash into the North Sea oil fields if Brown goes ahead with his recently ‘thought out’ billion pound tax on them. I’m no fan of big business, but I’m no fan of arrogant Scottish control freaks shoving extra taxes on companies at a moments notice purely to cover their own financial incompetence either.

The absolute nadir moment of the week for the Blair regime however, was watching UKIP’s Euro MP, Nigel Farage utterly condemn Blair to his face yesterday as "A cheese eating surrender monkey" after his abject performance at the Euro budget summit. What’s more, the insult was delivered via the state of the art communications system in front of the entire European Parliament, full to the rafters with every Euro MP available. The look on Blair’s face was an utter picture. The sudden realisation that, ‘yes, Tone, the entire nation really does hate you – period’ suddenly seemed to break through the façade that is ‘Tony Blair – religious missionary’….

And that was the act that sort of started the week of catastrophe. Tony Blair’s attempt at 'hard ball' with Chirac and the EU budget reforms. Over the past 3 months, Blair has shifted his position on the rebate issue. From, "No negotiation – period" to "We’ll only negotiate if it’s linked with reform of the CAP" to "We must play our part in the development of new member nations" to "This is not total surrender of any kind"……. Oh yes it is Tony. And what’s more we all know it is, (smoke and mirrors have just completely sold out at Toys’R’Us)…


A surrender monkey chewing on a nice piece of Wensleydale

What do we want? An English Parliament. When do we want it? NOW, NOW, NOW!

Make a note in your diary – and get organised for a London demo……

And if every English man and English woman joins in – it will be a day to remember, it will be a day to shake the complacency of the mealy mouthed establishment.

The 26th of March 2007 will be the 300th Anniversary of the Act of Union – the formal ending of the last Parliament of England in favour of the UK model.

It’s only a little over a year away – and it seems a perfect time to flag up all the injustices – and by then, I’m sure we’ll be pushing at an open door. This could be the big mo’ the movement has been waiting for……

Anyone who can get there should do, let’s make it bloody huge - let’s make history!

Time to declare….

I reckon it’s time for a national statement - our very own ‘Declaration of Albion’ don’t you think? Just like everyone else has...
So, inspired by the Scots declaration of national identity – the Declaration of Arbroath, I have prepared an English draft…..

The Declaration of Albion
If we should, by carelessness and too trusting of nature, give up by default what has belonged to us for centuries, and agree to make us and our sovereign country subject to the Scottish Raj or New Labour in general - then we should exert ourselves at once to drive them out as our implacable enemy.

For, as long as but a hundred of us remain alive, we will eventually wake up and never, on any condition be brought under Scottish, Welsh or anybody else’s rule for that matter.

It is in truth not for glory, nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting, but for freedom -- for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with life itself…..

(I’m trying to book Mel Gibson to make the speech)

Welcome to 'Warehouse blighted Blighty' – and the ‘spatial strategy’ as visualised by the Fat Control freak……

Good old Johnny Prescott. Not content with the 4 million new houses on brownish, (but mostly greenish) English land – fat boy wants to fill in the little bits of greenery that are left with monstrous warehouses.

Most of the Warehouse building frenzy will be taking place in the Midlands – and Prescott’s poodles in that part of the world - the ‘West Midlands Regional Assembly’ will, I’m sure be doing their very utmost to role over and betray the people that have elected them….. Sorry, really, really sorry, got a bit confused there – for a minute I thought I was living in some sort of ‘democracy’…

‘This weekend it emerged that the West Midlands Regional Assembly is considering plans for up to five "regional logistics sites" where several huge warehouses would be located side-by-side along major roads.

Under the plans, each site would cover 123-200 acres and would operate round the clock, generating 1,500 lorry journeys a day’…..

Hmmm, just how long do you think the WMRA will be ‘considering’ this proposal then? Until Prescott says he wants an answer – and the answer he wants is the ‘right’ answer, of course.

If you go to the great brown nosing talking shop that is the West Midlands Regional Assembly and have a look at their website – you’ll find lots of rubbish about partnerships, sustainable development this, regional concordat that, and the rather expressively and ludicrously titled ‘Regional Spatial Strategy’. Apparently, as it says on the home page, ‘RSS’ provides the detail of policies to ensure that physical development in the region will deliver renaissance for both urban and rural communities in the West Midlands.

Or, to put it another way, they’ll do whatever the Fat Controller tells them to.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Prescott you are an utter bastard – you are constructing a country fit for basket cases and a bloom of warehouses to put them in. It simply isn’t sustainable to build and build and build. The ‘Spatial Strategy’ is marketing bollocks for ‘let’s hoodwink the public with jargonese’ – because they’re thick enough to swallow it – and when they do twig it, we’ll all be drowning in concrete.

God, how I detest that man and his slash and burn agenda – as well as the fluffed up self importance brigade, who cannot wait to do his bidding for the promise of a gong or two and getting their towns twinned with Barbados. .

It’s all so predictable, innit?

I was watching a programme on Channel 4 on Saturday night – all about the ‘real’ story of the 4 Saints of the British Isles. Some guy I’ve never heard of introduced the programme, but never mind, I was sure Dr Robert Beckford would produce a dispassionate honest appraisal. Yeah, right.

Beckford waxed away as if he was on speaking terms with the 4 men in question. St Patrick was an educated man of letters, St David was a ‘home grown boy, St Andrew - a rallying saint for a noble nation ………. And poor old St George? Apparently, he’s been a magnet for racists, extremists and bigots…..

As the stereotypical and entirely predictable programme synopsis says – ‘The white racists and fascists who have appropriated the flag of St George would be astonished to discover that he is front runner as the ideal multicultural saint. Far from the genocidal warrior of Crusaders legend, he is venerated by Muslims as well as Christians….

I'm not sure many people do think of George as being a 'genocidal warrior' do they? I think most people know he came from the Middle East, along with St Andrew, Moses and Jesus. George was a Turk, tortured and killed by the Romans - as were a hell of a lot of saints. During the programme, I sort of got the impression from the Doc that all us thick English people think that George came from a sink housing estate in the Midlands. And as for the Doc's assertion that George has been appropriated by fascists and racists - I just bloody well despair.

One thing is clear ‘Dr’ Robert Beckford knows bugger all about anything – apart from being able to quote the p.c. New Labour directive on dissing anything representing the English or English consciousness.

Oh dear, an own goal from the Daily Mail.

In the sporting section of Wednesday’s Daily Mail, there was a nice graphic showing which teams had qualified for next year’s World Cup in Germany. Extra special attention was given to the top eight seeds – of which England and NOT ‘Team UK’ have been awarded the second seed spot.

Alongside each team was a little graphic denoting their country’s flag. Next to England was a Union Jack for God’s sake!…..

CONCLUSION
The plan to get 'Team UK' accepted into the population’s sporting psyche in time for the 2012 Olympic Games is well underway.....

Vagabonds, fakirs, footpads, n’er do wells and Jeffrey Archer need not apply

Filling in my application form to join the House of Lords recently, a little accompanying leaflet spelt out exactly what Lordshippyness is all about. The rather grandly monikered House of Lords Appointments Commission gravely spells out the very minimum requirements to realise a successful application.

The supporting literature, in Baronial black & white and headed ‘The Seven Principles of Public Life’ is unbending in the sort of talent they’re after.

The seven principles are –

Selflessness
Integrity
Objectivity
Accountability
Openess
Honesty
Leadership

Now maybe it’s the old cynic in me, but I reckon the best club in town – The House of Lords would be pretty well deserted apart from Lord Jesus of Judea and Lord St Francis of Assisi if everyone had to comply with these 7 principles.

And the prospect of people like Jeffrey Archer, Neil Kinnock and Margaret Thatcher qualifying for even 1 of the 7 is a fairly expansive leap of surreal thinking.

As predictable as a New Labour directive....

I got my long awaited reply from Anne Hogbin, the CEO of the Commonwealth Games Council for England, last week. The Council have just had a meeting to decide whether they stick with the current and entirely inappropriate ‘victory anthem’ for England’s medal ceremony at next year’s Games or change to what many consider to be the people of England’s choice. Regular readers may remember that I have been lobbying Ms Hogbin, trying to get ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ replaced by ‘Jerusalem’ as England’s victory anthem.

During my correspondence with her, I thought I had made quite a convincing case. LofHandG is a pretty jingoistic ditty, going on about Empire, subjugation of nations etc. I argued that Jerusalem was an aspirational song with an already proven national pedigree……

I was fairly hopeful, butI should have known better. This is what she wrote -

’Dear Mr. Wake,

The members of the Commonwealth Games Council for England met last week and one of the items for discussion was the Victory Anthem used for The Commonwealth Games.

I am writing to inform you that the members were unanimous in wishing to retain 'Land of Hope and Glory' as our anthem.

Thank you for your interest.

Ann Hogbin
Commonwealth Games Council for England, PO Box 36288, London SE19 2YY


A few days later, the Sunday Times ran a story about the England and Wales cricket board deciding to bin the singing of ‘Jerusalem’ before England test matches next season because it might insult, upset, stress out the opposition.

I think this is utter bollocks. I smell the dead, blighted hand of Noo Labour at work. The plain fact is, last Summer, Jerusalem became the unofficial-official people’s choice for an English National Anthem. No doubt this elicited catastrophic panic from the CEO of Noo Labour’s ‘Bringlish’ project.

I reckon a little bit of leaning has gone on here. A few words in ears to impressionable and creeping administrators has ensured that Jerusalem has suddenly suffered a McCarthyite fate and been declared an enemy of the people. – Not of course because of its stirring message of hope and aspiration, more due to the binding effect and sense of belonging it has on a people to their country.

And according to New Labour, that simply will not be allowed.

A sign of the times.....

Nostradamus I ain’t but….

How predictable – 1
Belgium is a little country, with not much power to do much bullying. Traditionally a country with not a lot going for it, apart from chocolates, a fat detective with a curly moustache and statue of a small boy widdling. So how come they’ve outmanoeuvred the UK?

During this cold snap, how come no-power Belgium can buy their ‘next day’ gas supplies 5 times cheaper than us. I’ll just repeat that – Belgium buy their ‘next day’ gas supplies, 5 times cheaper than us.

I thought we lived in a first world country, big, powerful and forceful. Obviously not.

I thought we lived in a continental wide free trade economy. Obviously not.

I thought Brussels had outlawed this sort of selective price selection - which is coincidentally the capital of Belgium. Obviously not.

My summation is that either we are governed by a load of incompetent idiots for whom the context of ‘next day’ is about 24 hours too long. OR, Tony Blair and his acolytes are using this natural incompetence as a way of getting his next generation of nuclear power stations programme through the Commons. Or both.

How predictable – 2.
‘Flu vaccines in England run out and Patricia Hewitt, Minister of State for Health cries "Don’t blame me or the NHS, blame the GPs, it’s all their fault!"

She blames all the GPs in England for actually doing what the Government’s own advertising campaign implored them to do and give out flu jabs to anyone who wanted them. Of course, anyone who wants a ‘flu jab – my advice is to head for Scotland. They’ve got loads. Why? Because they have a NATIONAL government who are committed to their own electorate – democracy in action.

Eh up – ‘chaos theory’ buggers up predictability model.
Did I just hear correctly? Michael Howard during PMQs has just chastised the PM and Patricia Hewitt for including the UK flu jab totals – when only in fact talking about England – he said "The department of health cannot tell the difference between England and the United Kingdom".


Blimey!

Interesting

An article from John Sentamu, Archbishop of York on how multiculturalism has betrayed the English - check it out.

If John Sentamu, a black Ugandan can say it's 'OK' to be English - then why can't Gisela Stuart, a white German, do the same?

(Probably because she's a bigoted old hag)

Murder by degrees.

The violent death of a WPC in a bungled bank robbery in Bradford has inevitably elicited carefully considered knee jerk reactions from those that should know better.

As usual, when one of our police officers gets shot, the great, the good and Michael Winner demand the reinstatement of capital punishment. As usual, there seems no problem rolling out brigades of police officers, forensics and back up to investigate the crime. The news footage on Friday and Saturday was a case in point – wall to wall police officers at the scene of crime.

They rounded up 6 suspects in London on Sunday. Within hours they headed north on the M1, destination Bradford. The police had instigated a rolling road-block – which means no cars were allowed to overtake the police convoy. They couldn’t anyway, police cars braced the entire 3 lanes of the motorway.

The size of the convoy was huge – 7 armoured police transit vehicles and a cocktail of 8 assorted high powered Beemers, Volvos and Range Rovers. 15 vehicles in all. Headlights blazing, blue lights flashing – and that’s not counting the local motor bikes and panda cars clearing the way in the urban sprawls at the beginning and end of the journey.

Lord Stevens, former Metropolitan Commissioner of Police has demanded the reinstatement of the death penalty for the murder of Police Officers.

Now I’m not demeaning this awful crime. I’m desperately sorry for this woman’s family – especially her kids. But I’d like to think that if an ordinary member of the public had been murdered, shot in a bungled robbery – all the stops would be pulled out to find the killers.

But I know they wouldn’t. Innocent people, including kids routinely get shot in all of our major cities without so much as a single hand wring from Lord Stevens. According to him and his ridiculously ill thought out statement, police officers lives are worth more than your average citizen – and that just isn’t right is it?

Some people are so unlucky aren't they?

The city of Hull has been voted the worst place to live in Britain.
Mind you, with people like him as a neighbour, that's hardly a surprise....

Smug John, doing his best to turn the whole of England into Greater Hull

Bringlish watch / edition1

Bringlish, adj. 1.How the establishment like to index 'Englishness' under 'Britishness' . 2) A title of convenience.

Example number 1.
Smart alec host of cerebral quiz show, Qi, actor and all round know all, Stephen Fry doesn’t know as much as he thinks he does.

He was on BBC Breakfast this morning, being interviewed about the launch of the interactive DVD version of the quiz show. He waxed lyrical about this and that. Oscar Wilde was clearly alive and well. He then waffled on about having the gift of being able to speak English – and how blessed he was in being born British….. Then he got a bit carried away and quoted Cecil Rhodes. He said all waxy and lyrical-like "And what was it Cecil Rhodes said ‘to be born British is to win the lottery of life"……

Sorry, Stevie mate. Not quite right is it? Rhodes didn’t say that did he? He actually said "To be born English is to win the lottery of life"……

Fry clearly bottled it – fearing a bit of a backlash if he uttered the ‘E’ word. Far better to go for England’s uglier alter ego – Britain.

But maybe, being born British qualifies Fry to a 10 quid prize – as opposed to the jackpot pay-out for being Blighty born……. And that makes me a millionaire!

Example number 2.
Back page of Monday’s edition of The Daily Express.
Pictures of Becks celebrating England’s win over Argentina and English golfer David Howells winning the big comp in the far east - and beating the mighty Tiger in the process. Alongside, Marcus Trescothick was pictured smashing a cricket ball all over the place in Pakistan - and English rugby union’s Mark Cuerto crashing over the Aussie try line. There was also a pic of a guy from Leeds scoring a try for the GB rugby league team… a GB team that is almost exclusively English.

So that’s 5 fantastic weekend sporting success stories – 4 exclusively English – and one English in all but name.

Daily Express’ headline? ‘Unstoppable – Beckham bullish on British glory weekend’….. and obviously accompanied with the regulation Union Jack graphic…

Funny though, I didn’t see Scotland’s glorious 1-1 draw with the USA mentioned in the ‘glory weekend’….

The word is spreading.....

Watching the lunchtime edition of ‘Look Northwest’ – the BBC’s local magazine programme, I was heartened by two aired items.

The first was a Labour MP for Rochdale complaining about the creeping regionalisation of the NW – the latest episode being the proposal to have all the ambulance services in the area housed under one single authority. The MP actually said that ‘the people’ do not want a regional approach – so why is the government doing it?

SUMMARY - Blimey, New Labour sheep sees real agenda light.

The second? A group of direct action heroes from an organisation called ‘CountyWatch’. Two guys, both in their 50's have spent the last few days taking down the ‘Welcome to Lancashire’ signs from the current county boundaries and relocating them to the pre ‘70’s border. The BBC followed them around, dutifully recording their acts of noble vandalism.

When asked whether or not they felt any guilt, they gave a great account of the validity of their case.

SUMMARY – the awkward squad is growing faster than fat-arsed Prescott could ever imagine

'The Wake' will go public - 2/12/05

'H' will be doing his utmost to persuade 80 political students at one of our seats of learning that the current democratic deficit in this country is totally unacceptable. I have a feeling I have a lot of work to do - as I think they are under the impression that English nationalist = shaven headed facist......

This old style, compassionate moderate left winger and passionate democrat will endeavour to put them right.

‘Stealth Regionalism' – the new, New Labour must have …

David Miliband, Minister for local government and Blair’s preferred dauphin has been busily finding out ways to get the ‘R’ strategy in England back on track. ‘Super councils’ are apparently the answer.

Super councils will run straight across county boundaries, sometimes amalgamating several into one new leviathan.
Super councils will eradicate traditional English shire counties – all 34 of them (you know, the ones that have been around for as long as 1,500 years)…….
Super councils will take power away from local communities – the district and county authorities will disappear, to be replaced by a unitary option…..

In a leaked report, Miliband was apparently concerned that the current two-tier system led to ‘confusion’ and created ‘fragmented leadership’……..

The Wake’s reaction to this b/s hyperbole is complete and utter homicidal anger. It’s nothing to do with supposedly making things more effective or more efficient. It’s got everything to do with dividing, emasculating and ruling my Country.

Come to think of it, this ‘to make things more efficient, we must make things bigger’ strategy has become a bit of a recurring theme over the past few weeks from various Labour ministries.

A couple of weeks ago a report stated that the existing police forces in England are to be rationalised down to less than half the current number. English health authorities are scheduled to have similar amalgamation fever bestowed on them - lucky us eh! Now if I didn’t know better, I’d say there just might be a bit of backdoor regionalisation going on.

Miliband, Blair, Prescott, Brown et al. Why do you hate us so much?

Plans at advanced stage for Team GB footy team……

Following the Scottish FA’s failure to play ball and the likelihood that the Welsh FA are about to decline the offer – it looks like the preposterous proposition of a GB football team playing in the 2012 Olympic Games is thankfully dead in the water.

Don’t you believe it! In my opinion, the formation of a Team GB is more certain than ever - as a direct result of the Scottish FA (and all the aggressive political baggage it would have brought with it) declining to offer any players to compete.

There are just the nervous Northern Ireland FA and the brown nosing English FA left to try and form a team. You can be assured the N.I. FA will follow the other two Celtic nations and decline. So how could the ‘Team GB’ project go ahead"

Simple. It’s what the political numpties have always hoped for. All 'lukewarminess' will have been banished, courtesy of the Celtic awkward squad vacating the table. The field will be free for the pathetically grovelling Chief Exec', David Davies and the rest of the English FA falling over themselves to co-operate with the Raj. And as the British Government have buried England constitutionally and politically, equating our country with ‘regions of Britain’ then in their opinion an all-English team, made up from the regions will be a perfectly satisfactory conclusion. Remember the Tour of Britain cycle race – Teams Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Team Britain…….. Team Britain was in reality, Team England. Remember when Rhona Martin and her 3 team members won the curling gold medal, they all came from the same very small curling club in Scotland.

The only way to stop this stupidity is for the English FA to suddenly develop a backbone and tell Tone, Seb', Colin and co' to sod off. And as we all know, when there is the sniff of a Knighthood in the air, backbones tend to be made of custard (soggy, no rigidity and yellow in colour).

BBC FiveLive phone in, starring David Davis….

A lesson in 'fobboffery' to an English nationalist….

This morning, between 9 and 9:30, Tory leadership candidate, Double Dee took phone calls from the general public.

The very last question, just before 9:30, was from a guy called ‘Sean’. He introduced himself to DD, and said he met him on a train platform station some time ago. Apparently, Sean was on his way to an English Constitutional Convention meet at Westminster – DD remembered him. Sean asked him 'here and now' to commit himself, should he become Tory leader to right the constitutional deficit in England and give us an English Parliament.

Cue bluster, waffle, the need to avoid an expensive second tier of English MPs, commitment to ensure only English MPs vote on English legislation – and as DD said at the end – "That’s the way to solve it"…..

I’m sure Sean would have come back, but he’d been well cut off by the BBC hatchet crew.

Well Dave, it bloody does not ‘solve it’ at all. You’ve ratted, like I always knew you would. The lofty utterances made 4 years ago about England having it’s own Parliament are but a distant memory in the stinking sea of mendacity that politics wallows in. Dave, it’ll come back and bite you, guaranteed.

For Double Dee, read Double Cee - as in crossed.

If you want to hear what Sean said and the waffle Davis blathered, then here it is. (When you get to the page, click on Davis' mug shot and the BBC radio player will open. Please wait till it buffers then drag the slider up to almost the end of the scale. Sean’s question is the last of the set, so it’s right at the end.

Tony Blair –footy pundit.

Well, did you see him on Saturday’s edition of BBC’s ‘On the Ball? The big cheester, the maestro of the body swerve, the guv’nor – Bite your legs Tony ‘Blairo’ Blair tucked in alongside ‘Motty’ ‘Lawro’ and the boy Manish Bhasin. As creative a midfield that you will ever see.

Blair looked a bit out of sorts. After all, a big responsibility had been placed on the nimble-footed, midfield dynamo’s shoulders - he’d just confined the legend, the old caber-tosser himself - Alan ‘Dour-Git’ Hansen to the subs bench.

SPECIAL STOP-THE-BALL COMPETITION

Using you skill and judgement, try and imagine where the ball might be in this action picture modelled by Blairo and Lawro.

Blairo tried hard to impose himself with a couple of early touches. Right from the off, he was given the opportunity to ‘put the record straight’ regarding the scurrilous allegation that he’d seen geordie baggy-trousered legend, ’Wor Jackie Milburn' doing his mesmeric goal poaching for the ‘Toon when Tone was barely out of his tartan nappies….

It was all so natural. It almost looked as if they hadn’t rehearsed the act at all, that much. Blairo said in answer to an ‘off the cuff’ enquiry from the boy Manish about how he was somehow ‘misquoted’. Quick as a Michael Owen run bearing down on Johnny Argentina’s goal, the boy Manish said "Yes, I think we just might be able to find a tape of that interview you gave on local radio all those years ago"….

Cue frantic search. Was the boy Manish offside? Was he lurking at the far post? Was he as reckless as Paul Merson in a betting shop? – What if the boot-room boys can’t find the radio clip?


Blairo tells Crooksy, Dour Git and Jug Ears how he scored the winning goal in the 1962 World Cup Final.

The search lasted all of half a second. The tape rolled, the camera zeroed onto Blairo’s throbbing, glistening forehead. He was sweating and –oh my God, he was wearing the notorious grey away kit. Would Motty and the boys be able to pick him out with a long cross-field ball? Fortunately Blairo could be seen for miles, thanks to the massive dark slicks of sweat oozing out from his armpit zones…. What would Fergie have said? Not much probably, I don’t think the former wife of Prince Andrew knows anything about footy kits.

Anyway, the tape droned on. The lady interviewer asked young Blairo who his footy heroes were when he was a kid…. Now this was a critical question. Every kid who has ever been to a footy match will ‘know’ footy players. I went to my first footy game in 1963. Liverpool v Spurs. I can name the full Liverpool footy team that appeared on that day, over 40 years ago – Lawrence, Moran, A’court, Milne, Yeats, Stevenson, Callaghan, Hunt, St John, Melia, Thomson…… I can also name most of the Spurs team – Brown, Jones, Henry, White, Greavse, Blanchflower, Smith, Mackay………

It was 2 nil to Spurs at half time, Liverpool banged in 5 in the second half and ran out winners 5-2. You just do not forget stuff like that – especially when you are a kid. It’s hard-wired into your brain…..

So just who were Blair’s heroes? He admitted to going to watch Newcastle in the ‘60’s on a regular basis. But when asked, he couldn’t name one, not one Newcastle player from that era. Instead, he stumbled and flapped and flanneled. He said he ‘admired’ the players that came after Jackie Milburn – a player of the ‘50’s right up to Malcolm MacDonald – a player of the ‘70’s – and that was it!

As far as I’m concerned that proves it – Blair knows jack about footy. He didn’t have a clue who his ‘idols’ were.

What a bloody fraud – I would have stuck with the ‘I saw Jackie Milburn playing’ lie – and not bother sitting there on the orange sofa listening to all the footy greats of the ‘60’s he couldn’t name…….

Stop Press – Tony Blair to appear on BBC ‘Holiday’ programme to ‘set the record straight’ about the scurrilous story that young rebel and Fidel Castro admirer, Tony Blair stowed away on a plane to Cuba – but ended up in Mexico instead, saga.

BBC busily editing tape to conclusively show that Tony specifically said that he did not stowaway, anywhere…