I know how to make a success of Brexit – call in Bridget Jones!
Big knickers, that’s what we need to make a triumphant success of Brexit. And perhaps half a bottle of chardonnay, ten Bensons and an ill-advised snog under the mistletoe.
Inside The Foreign Office (BBC2) set out a slightly different Bridget Jones plan for international trade, as we flew to Ulan Bator in Mongolia. This remote and sparsely populated nation is sitting on more gold, oil and other mineral wealth, head for head, than any other country on earth — and they’re eager to do business.
The British ambassador, Catherine Arnold, is nicknamed Bridget Jones by her staff, probably because of her resemblance to actress Renee Zellweger. She says she’d rather be like the Tomb Raider heroine Lara Croft, played by Angelina Jolie... which is just what Bridget would say.
Her solution to kickstarting trade with this ex-Communist country, sandwiched between Russia and China, was to stage a fashion show — and try to launch a trend for facemasks. it sounds mad; actually it’s brilliant.
Despite its vast, unpopulated steppes and mountain ranges, Mongolia has a pollution crisis, because of its smoking problem. Forget cigarettes: people here keep warm by burning mountains of old rubber tyres. Their smog makes Los Angeles look like a nature reserve.
The ambassador brought in a British firm making state-of-theart masks with built-in air filters, and helped them find Mongolian artists to design the patterns. Then she arranged a catwalk display.
The masks looked very chic. i suspect they’d sell by the truckload in Tokyo, too, where everyone wears pollution protection.
After last week’s pompous and staid introduction to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, this was an upbeat episode loaded with eccentricity. in Nigeria, we dropped in at a QBP, or Queen’s Birthday Party, where dozens of Lagos entrepreneurs were clamouring to strike an export deal over the canapes.
The mandarins back in Whitehall rolled their eyes whenever Brexit was mentioned, but this documentary suggests the referendum delivered a massive kick up the pinstripes to our diplomats, forcing them out of a lazy rut. Now they are scrambling to secure new business partners and that, as Bridget would say, is v.v. good.
Boris Johnson, who was Foreign Secretary when the show was filmed, seemed to be the only one not on top of his game. Trying to record chatty segments for his Twitter followers, he kept fluffing his lines.
if Boris is planning to go ‘full Portillo’ after politics and become a TV presenter, he’s going to have to tighten his technique.
Anyone wanting to know what a real diplomatic nightmare looks like could have tuned in to Nazi Murder Mysteries (Yesterday channel), which investigated how the Duke of Windsor hushed up a murder scandal when he was governor of the Bahamas during World War ii.
The former King Edward Viii and his American wife Wallis Simpson didn’t want Scotland Yard detectives snooping around their island hideaway. The British police might uncover evidence of money laundering and even treason.
So when Canadian gold magnate Sir Harry Oakes, the richest man in the Commonwealth, was found bludgeoned to death with a hammer, the Duke did everything he could to impose a news blackout and ensure the case was handled by corrupt American cops.
This was a complex account, briskly and clearly told, with excellent period news footage.
But while it focused on the Duke’s attempts to frame an innocent man, it made no effort to explain who really murdered Sir Harry. This was only half a story.
NEW TALENT OF THE WEEK: For lovers of noir crime and twisted family drama, Blood (C5) has been a real treat every night, building to a shocking climax. Its creator, Sophie Petzal, is just 28. Here’s looking forward to a lot more from this young writer.