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The Flying Pigs: You’ve got to be Downing your drinks to completely forget a party

Allegra Stratton announcing her resignation as an adviser to Boris Johnson (Photo: Jonathan Brady/PA)
Allegra Stratton announcing her resignation as an adviser to Boris Johnson (Photo: Jonathan Brady/PA)

The latest topical insights from Aberdeen musical sketch comedy team, The Flying Pigs.

Tanya Souter, lifestyle correspondent

I da ken aboot youse, but I am absolutely raging aboot yon video of Downing Street staff laughing it up aboot their perty, fan naeb’dy else wiz allowed tae meet up last Christmas. Apart fae onything it’s ruined the Wham song for me noo.

The Flying Pigs

It’s jist unasseptable, the hale thing. A’ those folk fa couldnae see their loved ones, or fa nivver got to see their loved ones iver again, and this lot are giggling aboot the cheese and wine nae being socially distanced.

And dinna tak us for mugs. OK, I can relate, I hiv attended mony a perty that I canna mind a thing aboot the day efter, but unless they were knocking back the Copie’s own brand vodka wi even mair ferocity than my pal Big Sonya, I dinna believe it.

Neither dae I believe that Boris Johnson is a man fa widna ging tae a perty in his ain hoose. Oh, I ken ahind the door it’s a big suite o’ offices, but look at him; yer nae telling me ‘at mannie canna sniff oot an Iceland prawn ring fae half a mile awa.

Noo, dinna get me wrang, personally I wiz gled tae hae an excuse nae tae see my extended femly last year. Nivver hiv I been sae pleased tae sit aboot in ma jimjams shovelling Matchmakers into ma moo a’ day. But I ken plenty folk that found it real upsetting, and the hale time these chuncers wis acting like the rules didna apply tae them.

And fa is this Algebra quine onywye? Well, of course she went tae the same school as Rishi Sunak, fa wiz best man tae her husband fa jist happens tae edit the Spectator magazine far Boris used tae work. But dinna worry, she wis definitely the best person for the £125,000 a year tax payer-funded job. Except, she maybe wisne. It’s hard tae tell because, despite getting the salary, she niver actually done it.

She wis hired a year ago tae dae the Number 10 press briefings, like CJ fae The West Wing, but that hale plan got shelved, presumably fan Boris discovered that she wisnae able tae lee wi’ a straight face.

Still, at least we got her resignation on the TV and that didnae hae so much giggling in it. In fact, she wiz greeting. In fairness tae her, I ‘hink they wis tears o’ genuine regret; though possibly over her decision ‘at morning tae pit on her Christmas jumper.

Ron Cluny, official council spokesman

Given Boris Johnson’s penchant for a classical allusion, how apt it would be if this most recent act of hubris were to be his nemesis. Or, if you prefer your academic pretentions to be Elizabethan, how apt it would be if the man who missed most of the critical early meetings about Covid so he could scribble out a remunerative pot-boiler about Shakespeare were to be hoist by his own petard.

You swim with sharks, you get bitten. You work with liars, you join in the collective deception, wholeheartedly and with a straight face, or you go under a bus

But, of course, Johnson has no intention of allowing this squalid incident to be the end of his administration. Why should he? Nothing important is at stake. No book deals or free holidays stand or fall on this. Only the moral authority of the government in a time of national crisis.

So, the great game of denial and blame continues. And, this time, Johnson has taken implausible deniability to stratospheric heights. “There was no party. It simply didn’t happen. Oh, that party? The one you have incontrovertible evidence of? Why didn’t you say?” Perhaps the most convincing reason for his confusion is that there were simply so many parties, he can’t really remember which one took place when.

Boris Johnson said he was ‘shocked’ by footage of Downing Street staff joking about a Christmas party in 2020 (Photo: Tayfun Salci/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock)

But, now that this particular skeleton has tumbled from the overcrowded closet, Johnson and his crew have come out swinging. Boris is (serious face on; stop tickling me, Jacob, this is important!) perfectly outraged – although, given his own record, presumably this is because telling lies and laughing about it is the sole privilege of the Head Boy and the prefects.

As a fellow communications professional, it rather rankles that some disbelieving laughter between press officers as to the state of the mess they may have to cover up is seen to merit resignation, while the people who created the bloody mess in the first place just carry on regardless.

But, this is the reality of the job. You swim with sharks, you get bitten. You work with liars, you join in the collective deception, wholeheartedly and with a straight face, or you go under a bus. Quite possibly a red one with a big lie painted on the side of it.


@FlyingPigNews

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