Number 10 Downing Street,
Sergeant Tom Robinson RLC – Open Government Licence
I’ve done my bit. The girls at work agreed to vote for Reform. I wrote the name of the candidate on their hands in biro so they knew who to find on the ballot paper. There were two downsides. One, I had to empty their trolleys at the end of the night, and second, one of the ladies was only 16.
‘Well, promise you’ll vote for Farage next time.’
‘I will if he’s still alive.’
‘Don’t be silly, girl, Mr Farage is immortal. Like Mrs Thatch… Oh, ahh, mmm.’
On that downer, and as the office (fake) Breitling touched five to ten, I set off with the trolleys. What, you might ask, is ’emptying the trolleys’? It’s putting all the goods back where they started after the bargain hunters have shopped them, wandered about, changed their minds and then dumped them somewhere they’re unwanted. A message there for the thieves and liars standing for election, and the psephologists who steal a living over-analysing their chances.
Is it wise to use Nicola Sturgeon as a pundit while under police investigation? At least it isn’t her ‘husband’ Peter Murrell who is presently under a charge of embezzlement.
Despite doing everything the globalists asked of her, even to the point of encouraging the sexual mutilation of children and putting rapists in women’s jails, Krankie has been reduced to an election night panellist sat next to Tom Bradbury.
The Westbourne House old boy (£37,080 per annum inc VAT) is a Navy captain’s son and was born in Malta. Tom’s (leftie social) credit score has fallen further by complaining of a shortage of white male election night TV anchors. Next week, while the rest of us look forward to being taxed to death, Tom can anticipate an early induction into Keith Starmers Wrong-Think Room 101 where Mistress Dawn Butler will administer posh boy conversion therapy while wearing her [trigger warning] punishment bra.
In anticipation of a bigly hike in the licence fee, the BBC doubled the presenting staff on their election special. Puffins’ favourite David Dimbleby has passed the baton to Laura Kuenssberg and omnipresent Clive Myrie. If politics is show business for ugly people, then Clive Myrie is Alsion Hammond and Alex Scott for brainy people.
Although grammar school boy Clive holds a University of Sussex Law degree, is a BBC lifer via a graduate trainee radio reporter scheme, and lives in Islington, it is tennis ball-bosomed Laura who catches the eye.
Laura took a 1st in History from the University of Edinburgh after being educated at Laurel Bank School, now part of Hutchesons’ Grammar (£19,995 per year inc VAT).
Laura came early to media – and fake news. Born in August 1976, her wiki entry states her place of birth as Rome, her birth notice in a contemporary newspaper says Como, 300 miles north of the Italian capital. Older sister, Joanna, was born in Peru, father Nick being an international businessman and onetime Chairman of Stoddard Sekers, the Renfrewshire-based carpet-making people.
If Mr Starmer’s successful Surrey businessman father was a working-class factory worker, then Ms Kunssberg’s grandfather jobbed for the NHS. Dr Ekkehard Kunssberg was a CBE and a co-founder and president of the Royal College of General Practitioners. The family home was on a leafy terrace, fashionably to the edge of Edinburgh’s Old Town.
Laura’s other close relatives include judges, colonial governor generals and diplomats.
Early guests on the BBC show were Steve Baker, the former Conservative MP for Wycombe, and the vile Peter Mandelson who over-egged an exit poll showing a lower-than-Tony-Blair Labour majority rather than the giga one some predicted.
A severe Peston warning hovered over ITV, with Robert sat around a table with Gideon Osbourne, Nicola Sturgeon and Ed Balls. Please, Mr Putin, launch a missile.
Later, the ITV coverage was to change to Good Morning Britain with the likes of Susanna Reid, Guto Harri, Labour veterans Harriet Harman and Gordon Brown and former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng. But not until 6 am by which time Puffins would all be asleep or making their escapes to the likes of Texas or Switzerland.
Meanwhile, a promotional video at GB News promised a night of Dewbs with election party with guests from across the Channel. Le Penn? Wow. Gets my vote. Oh, the TV channel – Dan Wootton, Brillo, Mark Steyn – worth a watch all the same. What?
On SKY, party animals Kay Burley and Puffins’ favourite Beff Rigby, who jollied during lockdown while others died but kept their jobs and avoided fixed penalty fines, were in the studio with Trevor Phillips, Ruth Davidson and Andy Burnham.
Poor Gillian Joseph had been sent on safari to Blyth & Ashington for what was expected to be the first declaration.
While we’re on the topic, gentlemen of words of a certain age and location can recall Kate from Wigan from the journalism course at Preston Polly. Here she is, sans a few decades and the plastic surgery.
An early fight broke out on SKY between Ruth Davidson and Andy Burnham as the first declarations from the North of England part-contradicted the exit poll.
That exit poll had predicted a Labour majority of 170, which reminds us to psephologist Sir John Curtice FRSA FRSE FBA, professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde (not its real name – The West of Scotland Technical College).
The 70-year-old professor’s Daily Telegraph article on election day morning, grandly titled ‘Just How Bad Will It Be For The Tories? My Final Prediction’ predicted no more than that there’s a general election today and the Tories will lose. As I say, stealing a living.
Every cloud has a silver lining. With a change of government and a clear out in the Commons, there might be some fresh faces on Question Time.
I wonder if the trannies in the carefully selected BBC audiences will whoop over Abena Oppong-Asare (Erith and Thamesmead) or Heather Iqbal (Dewsbury and Batley)?
Will the good people of Golders Green clap like seals when Afzal Khan (Manchester Rusholme) and Javeira Hussain (North East Cambridgeshire) come to the local leisure centre?
On the other hand, at least one podcaster will be voting against Chipiliro Kalebe-Nyamongo (Droitwich and Evesham), Christopher Wongsosaputro (Torbay) and Damola Animashuan (Tewkesbury).
While we’re on the subject, let’s have a shout-out for Baggy Shanker (Derby South), Bayo Alaba (Southend East and Rochford) and Carissma Griffiths (Mid Buckingshire) – as they close the gap with Tarquin Fin-tim-lin-bin-F’tang-F’tang-Olé-Biscuitbarrel.
Looking for daft names, I found Horatio Lovering (Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton). Initially assuming him to be a Jamaican League Two centre forward, he turned out to be a political advisor to the (former) prime minister at Number 10 – no doubt given an unwinnable seat as a first-time tryout.
As for the early results, after six declarations, the Labour share of the vote was up only 1% compared with 2019. Reform was generally second, the Tory vote had collapsed, and the Greens and LibDems tagged along well behind. Caveat: most of the early declarations were in the North East of England.
At which point the various panels seemed to give up on the declarations and talk amongst themselves about the new Labour administration.
The first LibDem gain was in Harrogate at about 1:30 am. A 21% drop in the Tory vote and a 10% increase for Ed Davey’s party sealed the win. Moments later, the Tories held on to Mark Francois’s Rayleigh & Wickford but lost a third of their vote. Reform narrowly beat Labour into second place.
All of which was rather baffling. After 15 results, Labour were on 40.8% of the national vote with Reform second on 21% and the Tories third in 18.8%. The LibDems were on 8.6%, with the Greens having doubled their 2019 share to 6.7%. One hopes for a Reform breakthrough somewhere to get some seats. Perhaps the East of England? And for some Labour constituencies in the ghettoes to fall to jihadis.
By this point (2am), I was starting to flag and so voted for bed. Here’s an old trick from journalism poly, if the event finishes after your deadline, end with:
‘And the rest is history.’
© Always Worth Saying 2024
