Cook’s first-class retirement

EVERY leading politician should learn from the dignified way that Alastair Cook retired this week from Test cricket.

After playing for more than a decade at the top of his profession, he will continue to turn out for his Essex county team for another three years.

What a contrast with both Tony Blair and David Cameron, who abruptly abandoned the House of Commons after standing down as prime minister.

This point was well made by Labour MP Chris Bryant, who said that the two men should have remained in front-line politics to offer the benefit of their years of experience.

In previous ages, ex-prime ministers often stayed on as MPs. A notable example was first-class cricketer Sir Alec Douglas-Home, who served as foreign secretary in the Heath government for four years after he lost the 1964 General Election as PM.

Intriguingly it was Sir Alec who once famously said, years before Britain joined what was then the Common Market, that the embryonic union of European countries was ‘a dead duck that could not quack’!