Now it’s the double thigh-squeezer

THE BREXIT soapie takes a new turn. A female columnist in the London Sunday Times says British Prime Minister Boris Johnson once put his hand on her thigh at a lunch when he was editor of weekly magazine The Spectator.

Charlotte Edwardes says he put his hand “high” up her leg and had “enough inner flesh beneath his fingers” to make her “sit suddenly upright”.

Afterwards she confided in the young woman sitting on Johnson’s left, who replied that Johnson had just done the same to her: Edwardes dubs the prime minister “the double thigh-squeezer”.

No 10 Downing Street denies the story but the cartoonists are having a field day. The Times has Johnson stumbling along the street, declaring himself to be “a model of restraint”, his trousers falling down, and his current lady companion, Carrie Symonds, walking with him and looking none too pleased.

This is an unusual image for a British prime minister but is it fatal? Probably not. More serious is whether his other “close friend”, the blonde pole dancer, benefited improperly when he was mayor of London.

That thigh-squeezing lunch. Sigh! I’m afraid it’s one of the hazards of journalism. I lost count long ago of the number of instances of being groped by female journos, especially at the Christmas party, which is known in the trade as a “wetstone”.

It’s nerve-racking; you’re like a fox being pursued by the pack. Why, only last week… (But you’d better wait for my memoirs).

But these are side issues. Yesterday, opposition MPs (who between them have a majority in the House of Commons) were due to meet to discuss what they can do to stop Bojo taking the Brits into a cliff-edge “no deal” Brexit. That could even include voting him out of office and setting up an interim “government of national unity”.

This is real drama. But a soapie does need to be pepped up with “double thigh-squeezing” lunches. What a script, this is a winner!

Human ape

AN ORANG-UTAN that spent the past 20 years in an Argentine zoo is being moved to a US animal sanctuary after being granted the same legal rights as humans.

Lawyers won a landmark appeal for Sandra, arguing she was being detained in Buenos Aires illegally, said the BBC.

The ruling found her to be Argentina’s first “non-human person, with the right to liberty”.

Judge Elena Liberatori says she wants her ruling to send a message “that animals are sentient beings and the first right they have is our obligation to respect them”.

Sandra’s legal victory brought international fame to her and set a precedent for apes to be legally deemed people rather than property.

She is to be transferred to Florida’s Centre for Great Apes – a 40.5 hectare sanctuary that is home to chimpanzees and orang-utan which have been freed from circuses, labs, zoos and private collections.

But hold on. How different is this really from that zoo in Buenos Aires? If Sandra the orang-utan is deemed to have the same legal rights as a human, where’s her free pass on the buses and trains and her season ticket for Disneyland?

Tailpiece

“I’ll have the steak and kiddley pie, please.”

“You mean the steak and kidney pie, sir?”

“That’s what I said, diddle I?”

Last word

It is no coincidence that in no known language does the phrase “as pretty as an airport” appear.