Good afternoon.
Years ago I made a documentary at Ford Open Prison in Sussex and, among the criminal gliteratti populating this former Fleet Air-arm base were a goodly number of the Met' Vice Squad. It was the late 70s and they weren't on a fact-finding mission nor had they gone down for a day by the sea: they'd gone down for bribery, corruption and perverting the course of justice. They were good company and quite bright.( Well, not that bright come to think of it.) Anyway, I am almost certain I could swear an oath that the assertion I am about to make is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.: none of them got bail. So it came as a massive and fatal shock to everyone involved when Inspector Garry Weddell, accused of murdering his wife, did. Duly bailed, he then apparently went on to kill his mother-in-law and , finally, himself. It is one of those stories with little upside beyond a fascination with the incompetence and irresponsibility of the system that let it happen. Marcus is trying to make head and/or tail of it.
Making head, tail and everything in between of our somewhat leaky benefit system was the little old lady who was aided and abetted in his misdemenour by her deaf-mute cousin. No lions featured though you might say she was a bit of a witch: But given the office for her crime was a cupboard this is a sort of Tales of Narnia from The Dark Side story. There is a bizarre amusement in it all until you hear how much she took off the system, a system set up to help you and for which you pay. Phil will wipe the smiles of our collective faces at 6.
Smile if you like pop music and Kelly Osbourne: they combine in a celebration of the work that is up for honours in this year's Brit Awards. Lucy is young enough to be your guide. If you are a little older and perhaps wrestle with the point of pop and even who Miss Osbourne is, then you may well be old enough to thoroughly enjoy our property report which tonight runs out of noughts explaining how much our dwellings are jointly worth. If you aren't in the property owning classes and, in some way, blame the politicians, we've one of the nicer ones on the programme explaining why he should be Mayor. He is neither Ken nor Boris so drop by. meet Brian and broaden your horizons.
You may well be tempted to broaden your horizons if , by chance, you hail a particular black-cab. One of my favourites is the guy in the Cuba cab: he wears a white straw fedora and won't hear a word against Fidel or those splendid, hand-made cigars. He does it for free because he genuinely cares and believes. There's another guy who is being paid to tell you how a bit of the world is better than where you live or even where you ask him to take you. It is a little further afield than the leafy suburbs but to say more would be to spoil his pitch and you know how cabbies hate to be interrupted or told to hush while you finish the cross-word. We had that Ben Scotchbrook in the back of this particular cab for this one.
By the way, the best bit about our top story about the cop released on bail is the judges reason for letting him out. I swear on my life I can't tell you and I swear, equally, on my life you will be shocked.
London's papers and Chrissies weather - a magic recipe for papier mache if ever I saw one.
See you at 6.
Alastair & Katie
