MONDAY
ALL ministers and their advisers have been summoned to a pow-wow at Chequers to discuss ways of bringing the country back together after the pandemic. Carrie is acting as host at the opening reception and uses the occasion to provide us with links to her new online boutique. This seems to specialise in flimsy-looking ladies foundation garments that wouldn’t keep out the mildest of chills let alone anything else. Harriet at Trade & Industry chides me mercilessly about this and insists that this is their entire purpose. The point is lost on me.
Dopey Williamson meanwhile is holding court over jam roly-polys and mllk-shakes and giving us his considered expertise on the Indian variant. “I think that once the Americans have done all their testing on the big tribes like the Cherokees and the Apaches we’ll be able to narrow it down and be in a better position to offer a vaccine.” Billingdon-Chives, the No 10 press secretary is already onto his second bottle of Bolly and is making throat-slitting gestures.
TUESDAY
TO business. We’ve all broken into groups to come up with ideas on putting the pandemic behind us. Monsignor Rees-Mogg is suddenly incarnate among us and proposes that we hold an annual Covid Olympics.
He wants to invite all nations to send representatives to England next year to compete in a series of Covid-themed games. “It would be our way of giving the pandemic a bloody nose,” he says.
He proposes distance swimming events with masks and mass vaccination contests where teams of medics compete to jab as many people as possible in three minutes. “We could also do socially distant boxing where the trick is NOT to touch your opponent.”
“The, um, frogs will love that one,” chortles the PM. Wide-boy Hancock, who’s been lolling around in his seat feigning disinterest suddenly snaps up straight. “I’ve got a few thousand PPE smocks lying untouched in one of those warehouses we bought from the Guptas. We could embroider them with the colours of each country’s national flag and flog them to the spectators at a tenner a pop. It would really make a statement.”
“And what sort of statement would that be,” asks Scary Patel with those big get-out-of-bed-and-never-come-back eyes.
“Just a statement,” says Hancock, whimpering now.
WEDNESDAY
IT’S annual Section 30 day with Nicola Sturgeon and her team. We each take turns to host it and this year it’s us.
The PM is new to this game and I’ve been asked to brief him. “The trick is to look stern and stick to the formalities,” I tell him. “That way, you get to look statesmanlike and uncompromising and the Sturgeon woman gets to look victimised and undermined. Both parties happy as Vietnamese Pot-bellies in ordure.”
“Ah, um, I think I’ve got it. A bit of the old, um, fist-thumping while giving her a rather large, um wink.”
Both sets of advisers have great fun while the premiers are having their tea and Battenberg. We have to make it seem to the press that it’s an angry meeting with sharp words. So, we all do pantomime desk-banging and stamping of feet and shouting of insults. The PM and Sturgeon enter into the spirit of it.
“This is, um, like the, um tail of the um, Trojan Horse wagging when um, old Odysseus and his chums jump out,” shouts Boris. “It’s an affrrrruunt to the Scuttuush people,” shouts Sturgeon, absolutely loving it.
THURSDAY
EVERYONE is absolutely buzzing about the video night organised by Hugo at Culture. He’s got some found footage from George Square in Glasgow during last week’s amazing street party they held to celebrate Brexit.
Monsignor Rees-Mogg can hardly contain himself. “I mean, Glasgow voted overwhelmingly to remain in the EU. But they’re all now rallying around the Union Jack because of the pandemic. Look, the police are participating too.”
Admittedly, some of them look a bit boisterous and over-zealous and seem to be carrying weapons. But the Monsignor assures us everything is in order.
FRIDAY
WE have a PR nightmare. The Guardian has got hold of a purchase order from an undertaker’s firm owned by one of Dominic Raab’s cousins. It seems they won a £65m contract to provide specialist PPE equipment in a deal brokered by Greasy Cameron.
A bloody investigative journalist has got inside one of the Gupta storage depots and taken pictures of the merchandise. It looks suspiciously like a very large consignment of shrouds. There’s weeping relatives everywhere
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