Billy the Beer

He's back, baseball cap and all!

Billy the beer, that erstwhile former leader of the Tory party has been caught with his pants ... OK, let's say half down!

As journalists and others dig into stories like this one, is he gay?, all sorts of things come tumbling out. Not only is the "other man" very young at half Billy's age but he's a quantity surveyor who graduated only five years ago yet he had become a special adviser to the UK's Foreign Secretary. How? On what basis? How and when did he apply and who conducted the interview? Was there an open competition for the job? Give me that job although the salary isn't that much I have to say!

Another aspect of the story is that as a former leader of the Party, Billy can apparently set his own agenda and do what he likes. They are saying the same about Iain Smith, the other former Tory leader in the Cabinet. The fact that these two are FAILED leaders seems to have got lost and in my world they behave or not and they are demoted or not.

Meanwhile, it seems that whatever the truth of this story, MPs and more especially senior MPs and Cabinet Ministers can get away with what they like.

One thing that comes across strongly for me, though, is the way Billy operates, on the basis that I have no time for the man. He boasted the other week how he and his Foreign Secretary equivalents from around the world text each other all the time. He also seems to tweet a lot. More than that, take a look at the photos in the press of Billy and then take a close look at his right hand: I think you will see a BlackBerry welded to it.

That BlackBerry welding says a lot more about Billy than many other things. Blair was hardly a technophile: as I understand he had/has never sent an email let alone used a PC (I stand to be corrected/updated). The fact that Billy is almost 50 years old and welded to a mobile phone tells me more than I need to know!

DW