Another day, another shambles. And I'm lying low when who should, to use a Rawnsleyism, sashay into my office but Carol Vorderman. "Hi, petal." "Hello, Carol." "What did you think of ickle ol' CV on QT?" "Words fail me. Rather as they did you." "What does Dave think?" "Generally?" "About me on QT. My speeches, my slogans, my quips, my dress, my legs . . ." "Your legs were under the table. As for the rest . . . perhaps they might have been better under the table, too. Apart from the dress, obviously."
“Obviously. So what next?" "There is no next." "But at the Spectator party Willie Hague promised me I could be Maths Tsar. He said I was Britain's greatest living mathematician."“Carol, I know mathematicians, and you are no mathematician." "Countdown?" "Multiplication and division and addition and . . ." "Your point being?" "For God's sake, woman, you took a Third." "Maybe. But it was a good Third."
To which there really is nothing that can be added. I put my head in my hands and, given time, CV takes the hint.
After a decent whisky, I telephone Dave to tell him that the Vorderman has been shredded. He is grateful, but shows it in a funny way by asking me to host a dinner for Baron Cashcroft when next he visits his Mayfair holiday home, and suggesting that the guest of honour should be Kirstie Allsopp. I put the phone down and pour myself another whisky.
Have we struggled for so long in order that a TV property show hostess, and a poor one at that, should have access to the levers of power? Have
we been in it to win it for Kirstie, a woman who not only failed to predict the crash, but didn't manage to notice it had happened and, many months after Lehman had passed its sell-by date, was still wittering on about renovations and loft extensions? It appears that the answers are yes and again yes. Yet more worrying than this surfeit of celebrity is that our blessed leader appears incapable of putting clear blue water between himself and Cashcroft, who, having bought up dozens of marginal seats, is now buying a host of marginal candidates and will soon own not only the party, but pretty much every member of it.
Little wonder Mandelson says that the Baron has Dave by the balls. For once, he may be underestimating things, because so fierce is Cashcroft's grip that many are beginning to wonder if Dave has any balls left to be squeezed.
