Were you still up for Portillo?

When I was heading back to Scotland from London on Wednesday, I turned round and saw a familiar figure. I was about to talk to him, because he was so familiar that I thought I really knew him, then I realised I only knew him from the television - it was Michael Portillo.

I ended up sitting over the isle from him on the plane, I didn't learn much about him though. He was reading the Telegraph, no surprise there, was doing some writing with a lovely fountain pen, and was doing some offline stuff on his Blackberry.

I have mixed feelings about Michael Portillo. When he was a minister under Thatcher and Major I really loathed him. He seemed one of those unthinking Tories, who was young and ambitious and would say anything to play to the Tory gallery, in order advance his career. I remember he made a nauseating speech at the Tory party conference one year about the SAS, that seemed designed just for the Tory rank and file.

However, having been continually tipped to lead the Tories one day, he seemed to destroy his own chances of being elected, by doing the opposite of playing to the gallery. I remember a speech he made during his leadership bid, about needing to reform the party to get elected again, that the Tory grandees really hated. His leadership chances seemed to evaporate overnight. The Tories had to go through another two useless leaders that got them nowhere, before they were ready to listen again to the same speech, this time read by David Cameron, and they elected him on, more or less, the same manifesto. Politics can be a funny thing. I guess that political parties are just collections of people, and people can be a funny thing.

Since he left politics, he is often one of the most interesting, and mainly impartial, political commentators. He now seems light years away from that young fresh faced guy, who made Tory ranks swoon, and made everyone else outside of the Tories think he was a total arse with that speech about the SAS. People's reaction to him losing his seat seemed to be one of the less good examples of politics as a spectator sport, the caption for the blog entry is from a book about the 1997 election. I think most of the left, me included, enjoyed seeing all those Tory heads fall at the time.

I decided it would have been a bit naff to try to talk to him, but I would have had loads of questions to ask him. But I did remember I had a satirical song about him from a BBC Radio 4 comedy show called the "Now Show" on my iPod. The "Now Show" is generally un-listenable to me. The two main guys in it who our older viewers may remember from the Mary Whitehouse Experience, seem to specialise in nasty sneery English public schoolboy humour, with little editing for taste. However, one time I heard it they had a really funny guy who wrote satirical songs, I think his name is Mitch Ben. There was a documentary Michael Portillo made, that I didn't see, where he was charged with being a teacher in a Liverpool school. The lyrics went -

"I may never forgive the BBC
for what they have just done to me
it's up with cancelling Doctor Who
and binning Jackanory too
I don't think I can take the stress
my emotions are a mess
I'm so sick I could eat my pillow
you've made me quite like Michael Portillo"

I remember the song ended -

"Am I really such a moral coward
at least I still hate Michael Howard"

So I had the unusual experience of listening to a satirical song about a politician, whilst looking at him in person at the same time. Do you think I should have let him listen?

Michael Howard was yet to win the Tory leadership when the song was written and also Doctor Who had not returned at that time, by the way, if you are really interested.

Clouds, not Portillo Paparazzi



I had my camera on the plane with me, as I was keen to get some nice shots out of the window. I could only get an isle seat, but the person who was supposed to be at the Window didn't show up, which caused a lengthy delay as the pulled their baggage out of the hold, but meant that I could sit next to the window.

I had a funny thought that I should try to sneak a pic of Michael Portillo reading his Torygraph, but I didn't think I would sell it for much on Paparazzi.com! So I took some rather attractive photos of clouds over Southern England instead.

Kirriemuir, Angus, Scotland - April 19 2007