By ’Tunji Ajibade
CHAIRMAN: Did you see The Mail?
MEMBER: I didn’t get a mail from him.
CHAIRMAN: Get mail? From whom?
MEMBER: The Secretary. Thought you meant emails notifying us of this meeting.
CHAIRMAN: This is an emergency meeting.
MEMBER: Meaning?
CHAIRMAN: Only you and I attend.
MEMBER: As usual.
CHAIRMAN: (frowns) Watch your tongue.
MEMBER: (struggling not to giggle) Yes, CHAIRMAN
CHAIRMAN: Watch it, MEMBER.
MEMBER’s lips are held tight, suppressing a laugh.
CHAIRMAN: He is at The Mail.
MEMBER: Who?
CHAIRMAN: The known arch enemy.
MEMBER: Boris. Good for him.
CHAIRMAN: I saw his column this morning and I– What’s good about it?
MEMBER: (shrugs) A journalist returns to his job.
CHAIRMAN: You mean that’s all you see; you don’t see this is a ticking bomb.
MEMBER: Everything about Boris ticks.
CHAIRMAN: How do you mean?
MEMBER: (surprised) I thought you’ve already figured that out. You always know everything about–
CHAIRMAN: (smiles self-assuredly) I was only kidding. Boris sure ticks.
MEMBER: You noticed he has been in the news himself?
CHARIMAN: Exactly what I mean. Supporting President Biden over cluster bombs while Number 10 waltzes.
MEMBER: Number 10’s waltz in anything should make you happy. It helps Labour in the general election.
CHAIRMAN: Number 10 makes my work more difficult.
MEMBER: I don’t get you.
CHAIRMAN: Their weakness is Boris’s strength. And you know he’s why I am here.
MEMBER looks unsure.
CHAIRMAN: I leave you, if you can’t figure it out. But he’s back where he’s most dangerous and that worries me.
MEMBER: Dangerous? I thought Number 10 was where he was most dangerous. And he’s not the one there now.
CHAIRMAN: It means you don’t see what I see.
MEMBER: I don’t.
CHAIRMAN: Boris is more dangerous now than ever.
MEMBER: Ehn-hen.
CHAIRMAN: (impatiently) How can you not know that? A–
MEMBER: –member of The Labour Party Strategic Planning Committee .
CHAIRMAN: (collects himself) Now he can defend himself and influence public opinion once again. It’s a disaster.
MEMBER: En-hen. He defended himself when he was in Number 10.
CHAIRMAN: That’s different. That time he did all he had to do as a politician.
MEMBER: He’s still one.
CHAIRMAN: Until he says he wants to come back into parliament, you mean.
MEMBER: Whichever – he writes, he expresses his view in The Mail, we listen.
CHAIRMAN: True, he has been attacking the Mayor of London though.
MEMBER: Sadiq is in trouble.
CHAIRMAN: Now you see my trouble.
MEMBER: Trouble?
CHAIRMAN: That’s why we are here, to strategise and find solution to–
MEMBER: –to what?
CHAIRMAN: The latest challenge Boris poses to Labour at The Mail.
MEMBER: I don’t see the point.
CHAIRMAN: You can’t. (aside) Who puts these dull heads in this committee with me? (turns back to MEMBER) The point is I need to counter– I mean, we need to counter the latest threat.
MEMBER: Threat?
CHAIRMAN: That Boris constitutes.
MEMBER: To Sadiq. Let Sadiq handle his own–
CHAIRMAN: Oh, what–
MEMBER: –kind of dull heads am I saddled with?
CHAIRMAN: I’m sorry.
MEMBER: I’m sorry too.
CHAIRMAN: I mean it.
MEMBER: Likewise me.
CHAIRMAN stares at MEMBER balefully.
CHAIRMAN: The challenge is that–
MEMBER: There’s always a challenge.
CHAIRMAN:I said, I’m sorry.
MEMBER: Likewise me.
CHAIRMAN: I meant to say this is not only about Sadiq, it is about the party as well.
MEMBER: Yeah.
CHAIRMAN: Did you read what Boris wrote lately?
MEMBER: Yes.
CHAIRMAN: So you got the point.
MEMBER: No, I didn’t get the point.
CHAIRMAN: You couldn’t have missed that part.
MEMBER: I did.
CHAIRMAN: Impossible, you couldn’t have if you read it. It was so central to–
MEMBER: I didn’t read it.
CHAIRMAN: But you said you did.
MEMBER: (shrugs) If it makes you happy. Remember, you said you read it. I didn’t.
CHAIRMAN: (looks dejected) He took on Sir Stammer.
MEMBER: He did when he was PM.
CHAIRMAN: This is different now.
MEMBER: I don’t see it.
CHAIRMAN: (an aside) You never see anything. (to MEMBER) He can do real damage now.
MEMBER: Ehn-hen.
CHAIRMAN: Haven’t you thought about it? What if someone hands him damaging materials about us?
MEMBER: About us?
CHAIRMAN: I mean about the party, the party leadership, you know, like the leaked files that Aljazeera TV got about us. Boris may use it against us and that may affect our election–
MEMBER: Let it happen first.
CHAIRMAN: What? And you are–
MEMBER: –a member of this strategic planning committee? Yes, I am.
CHAIRMAN: You needed to see what Boris wrote about our party leader in–
MEMBER: What did he write?
CHAIRMAN: (picks his smartphone) You know Sadiq plans to expand the scheme for car fee payment zone up to the capital’s borders with Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent and Surrey. The move will bring around five million more Londoners into the scheme.
MEMBER: I am aware.
CHAIRMAN: Now, in his column Boris cited the case of an 82-year-old man in Epsom who would be penalised by the daily £12.50 charge to go to his church in Orpington, Kent, because his old car does not comply with the zone’s emissions standards. He didn’t stop there. We wrote this; listen (reads on his smartphone) A tax must be fair; it must be justified; and it must be timely – and this tax fails on all counts.
MEMBER: That normal for him to say.
CHAIRMAN: Normal, include the example of the 82-year old man?
MEMBER: Everyone must complain about any new government policy.
CHAIRMAN stares at MEMBER.
CHAIRMAN: It’s a publicity coup, don’t you see? Swings opinion massively in his favour. Listen to what he further wrote (reads from the column on his smartphone): This ULEZ £12.50 tax on driving into London – and driving around outer London – is blatantly unfair in that it penalises such elderly motorists as the churchgoer in Epsom who are likely to have older vehicles. You got that?
MEMBER looks unimpressed.
CHAIRMAN: There is more. Hear this (reads from smartphone): It is the sheer bone-headed cruelty of Sadiq Khan’s scheme – rushed in with only nine months’ consultation – that is causing such indignation; and it is that indignation that is fomenting the panic in Labour ranks. For months the Labour stooges have played along with his claims. They have supported the ULEZ tax. Sir Keir Starmer has backed it fervently, in so far as he is capable of being fervent about anything.
MEMBER: Boris said that about our party leader?
CHAIRMAN: He did.
MEMBER laughs.
CHAIRMAN: What’s funny?
MEMBER: Of course, it’s funny.
CHAIRMAN: So, you don’t see the danger in this.
MEMBER: I don’t. Tell me.
CHAIRMAN stares at MEMBER, shaking his head.
CHAIRMAN: He’s doing the damaging job of criticizing our policies, something I normally organize journalists to do against the Tories. Now Boris is back in the trenches, shooting.
MEMBER: Good for him.
CHAIRMAN: Is that all you have to say?
MEMBER: You say the rest; you know you always know it all.
CHAIRMAN: If Boris continues in this role after we arrive Number 10, it will be a disaster.
MEMBER: Let’s get there first, we will deal with it.
CHAIRMAN: We should wait until he sends us packing?
MEMBER: From where?
CHAIRMAN: Number 10.
MEMBER: We are not there yet, so why do you worry?
CHAIRMAN: Boris may stop us from getting there even.
MEMBER: Let him try.
CHAIRMAN: He should try before I act, I mean before we act as members of this committee? Then why are we here?
MEMBER: You know.
CHAIRMAN: The part where he said if our party leader can be fervent about anything is what pains me.
MEMBER: Exactly which part of your body pains?
CHAIRMAN stares at MEMBER.
CHAIRMAN: I can’t believe this.
MEMBER: I can’t believe you worry over what hasn’t happened.
CHAIRMAN: My job is to– I mean our job is to prevent what is untoward from happening.
MEMBER: At this rate you will make our party leader age quickly; I hope you have not told him any of these.
CHAIRMAN: I need to, otherwise we stare disaster on the face.
MEMBER: You do, I don’t.
CHAIRMAN: You are impossible!
MEMBER: You are intolerable.
CHAIRMAN: (gets up) This meeting is over, over! I shall have you sacked from this committee.
MEMBER: (gets up and walks away) And I shall leak a file to–
CHAIRMAN: (follows MEMBER OUT) You do no such thing. In fact, I will– This is dangerous for the party. I can see we have a mole in our midst. You are mole! Boris’ mole!
tunjiaoa@gmail.com
