5th May 2010

There is some corner of the Groucho Bar

That is forever England

Because sitting in that corner is my friend, our dearly beloved national treasure, Mr Stephen Fry.  It is treason, still punishable by death – or at least (as Fry might say) seven shades of shit falling on your head – to query, question or otherwise undermine the pronouncements of the jewel in our national crown.

Fry, the Answer To The First Question.  (“Who shall I follow on Twitter?”)

Fry, the first lord of luvviedom, the one-man ‘wiki’ of extravagant and obscure knowledge; champion of Wodehouse, Wilde and Conan Doyle; emotional anchor of the Cambridge set of Thompson, Laurie et al; early adopter of all things Mac, et cetera, et cetera.

Oh and don’t forget the taxi in America.  The thoroughly decent openness on manic depression.   The heart-rending Who Do You Think You Are?

Meddle with this icon at your peril. 

ESPECIALLY if you’re still hoping to persuade him to come and make that drama series with you. 

ESPECIALLY if this all-round untouchable good guy nominated you for the Groucho.  These things are un-doable, you know.  Memberships may be withdrawn.

So, hold my hand, reader, while I say what I have to say.

Stephen oh Darling oh Sweetie oh Braveheart.  Vote 3?  Giving it a number doesn’t make it better!  Vote 3 is still a vote for the LibDems!

Why are you even contemplating it?  Ay me.

You seem to offer two reasons:

1) you think Clegg and Cable are “more impressive” than many other candidates and therefore , “our country can only be enriched, in its moment of economic crisis, by their presence in government at some level.”

Is it not, Great One, that you prefer any of their policies?   Which ones?

2)  you like the sound of a hung parliament.  (No double-entendres, please; these are serious issues and serious times.)  “The arguments, if arguments they be, that hung parliaments mean hobbled, lame parliaments are surely nonsense.”

Oh but Dear One, what motivates you to want a hung parliament?  “Our society is open enough, with its media and social networking, to force the politicians to come to a workable arrangement.”

I fear this is a “knock the heads together” argument similar to that espoused by another hero of mine, Armando Iannucci, in yesterday’s Independent.   It springs from a desire to see cleaner politics.   No argument there.

My concern is that a hung parliament entails back-room horse-trading; politicians disappearing into smoke-filled clubs to form and maintain governments, well away from the public eye.   I don’t think that produces open, clean politics, or delivers accountability.

Worse, hung parliaments give disproportionate power to centrist parties.  In our case, the LibDems have not said whether they would side with Labour or the Conservatives in the event that they held the balance of power.  It’s a huge choice, and the public would have NO say in it.   How democratic is that?

And how democratic is it that a party with 80 – 100 seats could hold what is laughably called the “balance” of power and freeze out a party – choose your colour – with 250 or more seats? 

How democratic is it that Nick Clegg would seek to insist on the choice of leader of another party?  (Perhaps you missed this while you were writing your book in Hollywood.  Mr Clegg first said that if Labour came third in the popular vote, then they would have “lost comprehensively” and he would not be able to support them.  Then he changed his mind, saying he would countenance supporting Labour in that event, but not Gordon Brown.  So, if it suited him, he would prop up a government which had “lost comprehensively”. )

None of which bodes well, Lovely Man, for the “determined effort to move to a genuinely open and well constructed parliamentary democracy” that excites you.

Oh I feel so horrible gainsaying you.  I embrace, kiss and adore you for speaking up for decency in politics.  An end to sniping?  Yes please.

And then I snipe at you.  I am loathsome and unworthy.  I have given way to base feelings, crude loyalties and deep turbulent emotions bubbling down in my depths.

I’ll be round the Groucho later to give back my little member’s keyfob.

As I walk away up Dean Street, the seven shades of shit will fall on my head, and I will know that my heart will never be at peace under an English heaven.

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