A Letter To David Cameron

It’s always good to see our betters thinking up new ways to tell us how to behave ourselves properly. If only we listened to them a bit more often and stopped asking impertinent questions, this country would be in a far better state. Tory leader David Cameron recently launched just such a scheme:

and to congratulate him I wrote thusly:

Dear Mr Cameron,

Your campaign urging people to ignore ‘tossers’ is an excellent idea. No doubt that balding smart-alec on Have We Got The News For You will turn this around, saying something snide like “Well if everyone does that, Cameron will never be prime minister”. Then whoever is hosting the wretched show (Kate Thornton or some such) will give him two points. If they dislike politics so much, why do they keep going on about it?

Anyway, I have instituted the scheme in my own house with admittedly mixed results. My nephew insisted on having a broad band for his computer. Apparently this makes sending emails quicker or something. As I occasionally use his computer to look up special interest web sites which need not concern us here, I decided to agree. But after seeing how much it costs each month I decided to cancel the broad band to my nephew’s computer. So already we have one less tosser in our house.

Next up was my mother, who has moved in with us due to her inability to do most everyday tasks – such as cooking, cleaning (herself or her environs) or talking to ethnic minorities without offending them. Spurred on by your campaign as well as the recent campaign by our energy supplier, I have switched the central heating off and removed the dial to the thermostat. My mother used to have this place like Korea, where I was stationed while in the army. Although there isn’t a brothel quite so close to our house as there was to the barracks. At least I don’t think there is.

Mother has screamed blue murder over this, asking if I want her to die of hypothermia. I don’t think it’s fair to ask such leading questions, but I politely ignored her and tossed her another blanket. She was always simultaneously blathering on about the good old days AND how hard she had it as a child. Well she doesn’t seem to be enjoying it now.

Next was the toughest nut to crack – my wife. Every day I count my blessings for having such a wonderful creature in my life but there are days when I envy Helen Keller’s other half. She told me in no uncertain terms that her toiletries, bus fare to her book club and so on did not count as luxuries. I explained your campaign to her but all I got was a lengthy tirade along the lines of “It reeks of rank hypocrisy that a Tory leader should tell us not to get into debt when his party, when it was in power, sold off every asset the country had and still drove the economy to the brink of collapse”.

Women and politics really don’t mix, do they? Apart from Baroness Thatcher, obviously, although I’m not sure she counts. To get away from the constant complaining in my household I and a few like-minded friends have booked a few days holiday in Amsterdam. Apparently there’s some late-night ping-pong tournament one of the chaps wants to see.

Anyway, keep up the good work, whatever it is you do and good luck for the elections.

Yours etc.

Those nice people at the Tory Party replied to my letter, as shown below:

Dear Mr -------,

Thank you for emailing David Cameron – I am replying on his behalf.

Thank you for your feedback on the Sort-it campaign. This is about doing rather than just talking. The sort-it campaign is not a political campaign. It’s about getting people to think about their own social responsibilities.

We don’t believe that in Opposition all you can do is talk about what you might do in Government. That’s why we’ve developed the Young Adult Trust; that’s why Conservative candidates are creating their own local social action projects around the country; and that’s why we’ve launched the sort-it campaign.

Thank you again for your email,

Yours sincerely,

David Beal
Correspondence Secretary
David Cameron's Office
House of Commons
London SW1A 0AA
www.conservatives.com

Nice to see my support is appreciated and I let them know as much by writing thusly:

Dear Mr Beal,
Thank you for getting back to me. I just want to let you know that the economy drive in our house is now in full swing. As you say, campaigns are about doing rather than just talking and if your party are ever allowed to run this country again, I’m sure you’ll do a lot to it.

Our family have completely jettisoned any unnecessary spending. We now shop at Kwik Save and while it does resemble a Jeremy Kyle special on supermarkets, they do have some remarkable bargains. My wretched nephew complains that the value soap powder (99p for 5 kilos – imagine that!) has caused his eczema to flare up to the point he looks like a sunburnt Simon Weston. But we all have to make our sacrifices. I, for instance, am having to survive on Gordon’s gin and generic tonic water, rather than my usual Tanqueray and Schweppes. But do I complain? Well after a few of them I have been known to berate my wife slightly, but not often. My wife seldom talks to me these days, anyway, which is a blessing in disguise if truth be known. Our new brand of shampoo is very cheap but it does make her look like one of the Jackson Five.

And of course my mother is taking all of this very hard. In order to instil a bit of the Blitz spirit into her I’ve moved her out to the garden shed (or ‘Anderson Shelter’ as we now call it) with a crash helmet and a box of egg powder. I think it’s worked as I haven’t heard her complain since (although that could be down to the double glazing).

I wondered how you chaps are managing with cost cutting? I read somewhere that your party is thirty million pounds in debt, which seems odd especially given the 66% pay rise you recently awarded yourself. Although I suppose it’s harder to get the old brown envelopes stuffed with cash when you’ve no peerages to offer. Perhaps you need to do some cost-cutting yourself? You haven’t got nearly as many MP’s as you used to, so perhaps you could scale down your operation a bit? Just a thought.

Anyway, keep plugging away at the politics. You’ve come on in leaps and bounds over the last few months and I’m confident you’ll soon get the hang of it.

Yours, etc.

I’ve always felt that my forthright views should be used in the political arena and the response below shows that I’ve always been right. It’s good to see they’re listening to the man in the street (Not tramps, obviously, unless they were formulating a policy on falling over or vomit.) I’m now clearly part of their wider think tank. Expect some sensible policy changes from the Tory party in the near future, as long as they continue to take my suggestions on board.

Dear Mr ______,

Thank you for your response - which has been noted.

Yours sincerely,

Alice Sheffield
David Cameron's Office
House of Commons
London SW1A 0AA