can you do better than this, Mr Murrill?

I won't even fisk this one from His Master's Voice. shame on you Mr Murrill (editor), this has to take the arse-licker award of 2010, and this early in the year too. I have noticed that HMV does not pay much attention to the comments which appear on its stories, sometimes they are racist or libellous and are left in there, but this means that on this "story" someone rightly comments that despite Mr Salter's loud shouting about Gurkhas and hugging of Joanna Lumley he voted "No" to a resolution in Parliament calling for Gurkhas to have the right to stay ini the UK. Spookily I ran into a member of Reading's Nepalese community at Amsterdam Schiphol airport yesterday, she has a keen interest in the Gurkha issue as you might expect, and I will leave our conversation to the imagination to protect her confidence.

Oh and let us hope that Mr Salter's "running around" with Trisha Goddard "in the early 1970s", as he says, went no further than that. Ms Goddard turned 16 on 23 December 1973, which is starting to get out of "early 1970s" territory. Mr Salter began his academic career at Sussex University at the age of 18, in October 1972. At which point he acquired a whole new set of friends, not from the London suburbs. I still know some of them.

Martin Salter's tales of famous friends

By Linda Fort
January 07, 2010

The Reading West MP is dropping plenty of celebrity names in his final annual report before stepping down at the General Election.

The front page features Martin Salter hugging actress Joanna Lumley and a Gurkha.

The second page has him shaking the hand of the Reverend Jesse Jackson.

And the next page features an interview by Trisha Goddard, an old friend from his schooldays.

The TV chat show host – three years his junior – was a pupil at the independent girls’ school Sir William Perkins in Chertsey, Surrey, while Mr Salter went to a grammar school in Egham four miles away.

In the interview, Ms Goddard asks the MP how he got into politics, what he has achieved, about his work in Parliament and what he plans next.

After a long gap, Mr Salter and Ms Goddard recently made contact and renewed their friendship.

Mr Salter said: “Back in the early 70s I used to run around with the same group of people as Trisha and it has been great to pick up the threads of our misspent youth.

“Trisha went into journalism and became well known as a campaigner on mental health issues, whilst I drifted into politics.

“I was really pleased a couple of years ago when Trisha invited Reading mum Liz Longhurst on to her show to promote the campaign we were running against violent internet pornography.

“I am hoping we will be able to do some more work together in the future.”

Mr Salter is also offering to organise farewell meetings in his constituency, if there is a local demand before the general election is called.

He said: “When I announced I was standing down back in February, over 500 of my constituents wrote to me, many of whom asked if I was planning any farewell events.

“People really were most kind and generous in their comments and I thought this would be a nice opportunity for me to visit a number of communities in my constituency to thank them personally for their support and encouragement over the last 13 years.”

Saturday

update on the below - looks like the Togo team have now pulled out of the contest and three people are dead, very sad.

the Togo football team has been shot at, with the driver of their bus apparently killed and four players hurt. Seems they were not the precise target, and the attack was part of the Cabinda separatist issue in Angola, where the Africa Cup of Nations is being held, as the world's people know. I have never been to Angola, or to Togo either (though I got close to the latter when I was an election observer in Ghana in 2004, in a constituency close to the Togo border). However I have since 2007 had Togolese family, as in that year my niece married a man from Togo and adopted his son - they are expecting a child of their own in May this year. So I have francophone African family members, to whom I send French football magazines and French BD (graphic or comic books) sometimes. Anyone remember how in the apartheid times beefy red-faced men used to appear on television saying "Keep politics out of sport"? They wanted the white-only South African teams to play internationally of course. What has changed? (This is a serious question).

Anyway, Le Monde had an interesting article last week about working girls in South Africa (a great many of whom are from Zimbabwe, now why would they want to leave that country?) and how their earning prospects are expected to be enhanced by the football World Cup in South Africa later this year. One of them said that it was rich white men who were the ones who tried to get away without paying. Hmmm.

who is sticking the knife into whom?

a reader writes

Salter has attempted to grab kudos over the latest failed coup - releasing the text message of reprimand that he sent to Hoon and Hewitt.

He said that it ill behoved an ex Chief Whip (Hoon) to behave in such a dastardly manner and as for Hewitt, he couldn't see why she was sticking her oar in as she was making a lot of dosh from external jobs (BT) and was standing down anyway.

He ensured that his text message was the first read out by Newsnight.

Of course Gordon has made a total hash of everything - but I would have thought that the fates could have spared him the dubious pleasure of being 'protected' and patronised by the likes of Salter.

Quite.

a much photographed man

a reader informs me of this site - I had not seen it myself as there may be people who are less keen on Jane Austen than I am but I have not met them yet. However, I don't know, caption competition or what?

scary, hein?

Little Dog Face, writ, as it were, large

for your delectation, stakeholders of the Carbon Trust!

little dog face

was the Reading nickname, suitably Brechtian I thought, for someone called Ann Morgan, who is now, it appears, horribly, Stakeholder Manager for the Carbon Trust. And you wonder why you have never heard of the Carbon Trust? You probably never will again. She cites her only job prior to that role as Constituency Manager for Martin Salter MP, a post she held for some six years with no noticeable efficiency or flair. It was her only job, as she was, even more horribly, the squeeze of Cllr Jon Fatboy Hartley for some time, and a such had no housing or living costs, as he lives on rental income from property donated by parents. Very socialist, eh, Cllr Rachman?

a good thing I went back

I am just over half way through a three-week period of home leave, as my employers call it, which so far is thoroughly enjoyable, catching up with friends and family, having had a lovely family Christmas in Mullion, Cornwall (we had three kitchens between us, so cooking the Christmas meal was the least stressful it has ever been, I am spoiled) and now in lovely Cyprus for New Year - December sunshine in Cyprus is the only way a redhead like me can sunbathe safely - and as part of that I was in Reading for a few days before Christmas. We left, by train, on Monday 21st December in heavy snow, and had of course a trouble-free journey west. I was amused to hear Mr Salter defending "My Council, Right Or Wrong" although many of his constituents must have been outraged at Reading council's complacent and negligent attitude to the management of its roads. But what does he care? The council delivers his election leaflets, he has told us many times. Corruption. Where was I? Ah yes. Reading. I picked up a paper copy of the Reading Evening Post, pre-Christmas edition, and what a joy it was. There was a report of the funeral of former mayor of Reading Bob Green, with a large picture of, you guessed it, Mr Salter, and no pictures of Mr Green's family. Perhaps that is what the family wanted. Perhaps. And Mr Green's widow Jill is no pushover, to my personal knowledge. But was it not distasteful to make quite so many phone calls and leave quite so many messages with family members unknown personally to Mr Salter, in Mr Salter's ultimately successful endeavour to be allowed to make a speech at the funeral? Putting pressure on the bereaved at a time of grief? I only ask.

That same edition of His Master's Voice carried a full-page advertisement for, er, the Reading Evening Post, with a big picture of its editor, Kent coalfields secondary modern boy Andy Murrill, who ought not to have had quite such a heavy night before getting his picture taken - a night on the booze gives you a puffy face the next day Andy old man.