Someone had reported that I had left our eight year old daughter Nancy behind in the pub and gone home. I mean, it was a pure accident. Could have happened to anyone. There I was, with Sam, the kids, and some friends, having a meal and some drinks, and you know how it is, one too many and before you know it you’ve already driven home.
When I got home, Sam looked at me, I looked at Sam, and I thought my luck was in. And then, just as I was making my move, Sam says - where’s Nancy?
My stomach lurched, I can tell you. I wasn’t really fit for driving you see. But Sam insisted; said she wasn’t going back to the pub to have all those people looking at her as if she’s a bad mother.
And the next thing you know, the SS is on our doorstep demanding entry to our home! Who the hell do they think they are? I’m the Prime Minister, for goodness sake.
There were two of them. One seemed very nice, but the other one, well, she sat there with her black dress and fingernails to match, staring out from under her dark, bushy eyebrows; she had the look of a future leader about her.
The pair of them gave us a grilling: how often do we leave our children behind, where was the Australian nanny, have Sam or I ever taken or dealt drugs, and a host of the most intimate questions.
Then they got down to it. Parenting classes, they said! Parenting classes and a psychological assessment.
They said that depending on the results of those that they would decide if any further action would be taken, including the possibility of us having our children removed! I said, that’s hardly fair ... we only forgot one of them, why take the lot?
Government targets, they said. Oh hell.
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Ken is delighted. He said he spent some wonderful evenings in that hotel in Virginia with Peter. I wonder how that ended up!
As for how they spent their days, he said that he and all his internationalist colleagues got so much agreed that I’m going to be a very busy boy over the next year or so.
Doing what, I asked?
Oh, can’t tell you that, he said. Chatham House rules, he said. It will all become clear in time, he said.
It’s not fair! Even that little twerp Rory has been to that meeting. George went last year too. Why can’t I go? All I get is told what to do, and out comes the Tory Whip to make me do it! I should count my blessings, I suppose. At least there are no photographs hanging over my head, unlike others sitting very close to me at the Cabinet table.
But anyway, its amazing what a bit of whining will get you. Ken finally gave me this to shut me up: Assad will soon be gone, just like Gaddafi. Mr Rockefeller’s plan for 13,000 casualties at the Olympics got the go ahead. Oh, and Tony will be President of Europe.