Although the Prime Minister is highly intelligent, a natural tendency to talk down to people means that he often manifests a dual public persona, or cross between "Dave the Vague" and "Dave the Wide-Boy". We also know that he can be totally ruthless. Both personae were in play last week as "Dave the Diffident", an unmediated version of "Dave the Vague", which has some similarity to the manner adopted by Harold Macmillan, ruthlessly sacked various ministers and vaguely informed the House of Commons of a "form of review" of "airport capacity" (See below) Meanwhile, "Dave the Wide-Boy" proclaimed that he would "get planners off people's backs" and the nation's potentially dodgy extensions off the ground in a manner more reminiscent of Del Boy Trotter.
In the midst of all this, I had a dream - and I jest not - about being given a lift by former James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan around the M25 and environs where some new and rather ugly development was taking shape. The journey ended, however, in an unregenerated inner urban neighbourhood. What could this vision presage, I wondered, except the continuing inability of the present government, like the previous one, to properly tackle the regeneration of Britain's inner city and older industrial areas, particularly in the Midlands and North of England? I was, nevertheless, curious about the significance of the Bond figure. Upon reflection, I think this was Brosnan as he appeared in "The Ghost Writer", apparently in a role based on that of former prime minister Blair.
I've since reflected that Colin Firth, an actor able to take on tragic and comic roles in equal measure, might one day play Dave Cameron very well. In the meantime, it behoves the Prime Minister to both wise up the content of his public pronouncements, and, given the obvious inferiority of his comic persona to that of London Mayor Boris Johnson (a figure even the creme de la creme of British comedy creators could not dream up), to seriously consider enhancing the No 10 sense of humour department, through the engagement of some new speech writers as well as technical advisers.
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