PETER RICHARDSON: Out of the trough, on to the gravy train
In matters of an electoral nature, our family has previous convictions for exercising, shall we say, a little sleight of hand.
My old dad, for instance, was a regular in the Conservative Club, but only because the beer was well kept.
As and when the situation demanded, he would put down his pint long enough to go out and canvass for the Labour Party.
The mother-in-law, a former pub landlady who still had all her chairs at home well into her 80s, was similarly adept.
It was in these later years that she began telephoning the Tories to ask for lifts to the polling station.
Invariably, she said, they offered a better class of car.
Once delivered, she would nip into the booth, place her cross where it
mattered, then get a lift home again, thanking her chauffeur for his time and trouble...
All the while thinking, if only they knew...
What she knew, of course, was the importance of voting. So too my old man, who was forever telling me how folk had fought and died for the right.
Being a Labour councillor, I expect my paternal grandfather would have drilled home the same message, if only he hadn't won a seat in the celestial council chamber the week before I was born.
All of them, I fear, will be rotating in their graves at a speed in excess even of that displayed by so many MPs recently in the rush to buy a felt-tip pen prior to releasing details of their expenses.
For the first time in my adult life, I didn't vote.
Ridiculous now, when I look back on the reason for abstaining.
I thought I was making a protest against the self-serving, snouts-in-the-trough spectacle that is national politics.
But why would I want to deprive one party of my democratic contribution when they were all at it ... Labour, Tories, Lib Dems, the lot?
In declining to vote for the local representatives of Bathplug Jacqui and her husband's mucky films, all I inadvertently managed to do was
benefit the party which gave us high-on-the Hogg, his admirably spotless moat and his duck island mate.
Worst of all, I've let in that BNP bloke.
If so-called protesters like me had really thought it through, he wouldn't have sneaked in under the wire. As it is, he got 8% and a ride aboard the biggest gravy train of them all.
I was once a guest of the European Parliament in Brussels, invited by an MEP out of his media communications budget. We were given champagne and taken to fancy restaurants where, my fellow taxpayers may rest assured, I made sure I consumed my money's worth on your behalf.
At first, though, they wouldn't actually let me through security. Queuing up for a pass into the parliamentary building, when my turn came I was informed I was already inside.
Thankfully, it didn't take a genius to work out that two people of the same name were crackers enough to want admission to this house of hot air.
I didn't stay too long, but long enough to discover that elected MEPs have no real power. Everything is decided by ommissioners who share the common denominator of being totally unelected.
But in exchange for shuffling paper and waffling on to no great purpose, an MEP gets more than 400,000 in salary,
pension benefits and expenses. No receipts necessary, naturally.
And into the midst of this help-yourself, all-you-can-eat carvery, I have, by my own shortsightedness, pitched a man from the BNP.
This column tries not to do politics too often but it has been unavoidable recently. Let's just keep it brief with regard to Mr Eight Percent and his cronies.
Not racist? Course not. It's just that if you're black you can't join the BNP.
That says all anyone needs to know.
Sorry dad.
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Weather for Wigan
Thursday 09 February 2012
Today
Light sleet
Temperature: 1 C to 2 C
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Wind direction: South
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Light sleet
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