BARON BOOM BOOM..

Had it not been for his untimely death some years ago now, I could well have mistaken the events in the House of Lords yesterday for the elevation to the peerage of the great Les Dawson. Instead, we had the newly enobled Baron Prescott of Kingston upon Hull looking and sounding for all the world like the much missed Les.

I`ve gone on before about the absurdity of serial embarrassment Prescott being granted his peerage so I won`t repeat that rant again here. However, yesterday`s induction ceremony produced a kind of unintentional satire that reminded me of Les Dawson at his finest. Trouble was, no-one could see the joke, the funny side of it. The Erminator entered stage left flanked by his supporters, Lords Grocott and Dixon (prsumably of Dock Green) and listened intently as the Reading Clerk announced that he would have "the state, degree, style, dignity and honour of Baron Prescott," would "have, hold and possess a seat in our counsels" for the rest of his life and be entitled to the "pre-eminences, immunities and advantages to the degree of a baron duly and rightly belonging." You really couldn`t make it up.

The Reading Clerk`s language mangling must have made the Baron feel quite at home, especially the knowledge that he now cops for £300 a day of taxpayers money on expenses without having to do or, mercifully, say anything. But I am looking forward to his maiden speech in the House of "flunkery and titles" he said he would never join. He might well take another leaf from the Les Dawson compendium to make a speech in keeping with his visage, his pretence and his boom boom style. Here`s one:-

Duck goes into the chemist's shop.

"A tube of lipsol please.''

"Certainly, that will be fifty pence."

''Put it on my bill, please."

Boom Boom indeed.