Ed set fire to our carpet... then bought a prayer mat to cover it up
GORDON BROWN TELLS
ME TO MAKE ED AN MP
Wednesday, March 2, 2005. Our house My first conversation with Ed. He calls me as agreed at 2.30pm on the dot. We have a 40-minute phone call. He really impresses me. He wants to meet me tomorrow and keeps referring to Gordon. He clearly wants him to make his case for him. He is desperate to have the meeting at the Treasury, so he can wheel out Gordon, not the Cabinet Office, where I have another meeting to attend. Thursday, March 3, 2005, 2.30pm HM Treasury, London Ed meets us. He is unbelievably gracious and charming, and leads us into a small anteroom overlooking a quiet side street.
He is incredibly young with soft olive skin.
His speech is so nasal it gets in the way of what he is saying.
Sure enough, Ed says that Gordon wants to ‘pop in and say hello’. I should have told him that I don’t do star-struck.
Having said that, when the door opens and Gordon walks in, he is friendly, warm-hearted, relaxed and incredibly impressive.
He pulls up a chair, swinging it into place at our table, sits down and says he’s ordered some cream cakes to go with the pot of tea we’re having. ‘Tea and cream cakes with Gordon Brown at the Treasury – that’s one to tell the grandkids,’ I say to myself.
‘Ed’s been telling me about the fantastic work you’re doing in Doncaster, Martin,’ he tells me excitedly.
I explain that we are witnessing the birth of a new city with one of the most comprehensive economic regeneration portfolios in the UK.
Gordon appears enthused – and sends Ed out for a fresh pot of tea.
I tell Gordon that with my support as mayor and kingmaker, Ed’s success in Doncaster is practically a done deal.
Gordon continues: ‘It’s incredibly important for me to have Ed elected in Doncaster North… you just need to let me know what you require in return.’
‘Thank you, I might not want anything, I might want everything. Let’s get Ed elected first, Chancellor.’ ‘Call me Gordon, Martin.’ (In fact I had already told very senior party figures I wanted to be a successful mayor and then join the Lords. It had been indicated that I had every expectation of achieving that. There are no Labour peers from Doncaster and we need and deserve a voice there.)
I tell Gordon that Ed needs to hit the ground running and come up to Doncaster this evening, so we can get him out there meeting people as of tomorrow.
Gordon thanks us again and we leave. As we depart, I reflect on the meeting and its success.
With Ed as our newest MP and Gordon soon to be PM, I will be able to access the PM to pitch our development programme for Doncaster and the North of England. The strategy makes sense. 4.30pm – Train from King’s Cross to Doncaster Ed has a bag packed to take up the offer to stay at my house, and we get the train to Doncaster.
I text Carolyne: ‘Guess who’s coming to dinner?’
Ed is full of questions: what is Doncaster like; who are the key players he needs to talk to; what should his tactics be?
I give him the answers. I make it very clear that, as mayor, I intend to be seen to have supported the winning candidate, and Ed
should make no bones about it – he will win.
8.30pm I have been winding Ed up about Carolyne doing the real ‘interview’ with him when we get back to Doncaster.
‘She’s been a card-carrying member of the Labour Party since she was 18, so you’ll do well to pass muster,’ I tell him.
9pm – Our house I introduce Ed to Carolyne.
My children Beth [then 14, now 24], Joss [then 11, now 21] and Marcey [then 10, 20 next week] are hyper about our special guest.
A BUNK IN ‘FUTURE PRIME
MINISTER’S BEDROOM’
11.30pm We show Ed his bedroom for the evening (Joss’s room – Joss moves out and Ed gets the bottom bunk). It is emblazoned with posters of Manchester United players, Joss’s favourite team.
Carolyne has put a sign on the door reading ‘FUTURE PRIME MINISTER’S BEDROOM’.
We say good night to Ed.
ED MAKES A BAD IMPRESSION
ON THE KIDS AT BREAKFAST
Friday, March 4, 2005, 7.45am Ed tells me what a bizarre breakfast he’s had this morning.
The children were having a heated argument over whether George Seurat’s painting, The Bathers At Asnières, is an example of pointillism or of French impressionism.
‘What do you think Ed?’ they asked him. He says he found it all quite odd and not what he’d expected at all.
I ask him whether he considers it an example of pointillism. He is flummoxedf – so I tell him most young people in Doncaster like to debate the history of art over breakfast! It was as if he didn’t expect Northern kids to be so well versed in fine art. The children found it patronising – and made h him pay for it later.
11.30am I have spare keys cut so that E Ed has access to our house and m my office.
Carolyne has converted the c children’s playroom into a b bedroom for Ed. It is bright yellow and green. We bought Ed a wardrobe and bed specially for him. He is to use the laundry bin we have put in ‘his room’ and our housekeeper will do his washing.
I am keen to make sure local Left-wing militants do not find out Ed is living at our house. If they do, they will do anything to stop him becoming MP. As mayor, I have to play a straight bat in public, backing no one and offering all candidates the same support.
In reality I am not just backing Ed, I am sponsoring him.
DOORMAT ED CAN’T EVEN
SHUT THE FRONT DOOR
Sunday, March 6, 2005 We’ve always been tight on security in our house, with burglar alarms and front and rear door sensors. They alert us when a door is being opened by emitting loud electronic ‘ding-dong’ alarms. Every time the door opens it beeps, so if the mat is stuck on the threshold and you keep trying and failing to close the door, it keeps beeping.
Marcey joins Carolyne and me in our bedroom and says: ‘You know that fella living in the playroom. He’s not very bright, is he?’
Carolyne says: ‘He’s actually really intelligent. Why do you say that?’ ‘Yesterday morning,’ says Marcey, ‘I was in bed halfasleep and heard him going out the front door.
‘You know what happens when the doormat gets trapped under the door – it kept beeping. He must have tried it ten times so I came downstairs to do it for him.
‘He was on his knees trying to look under the door – he couldn’t work out why it wouldn’t shut properly. I said, “I’ll do it.”’
‘He said, “I think I’ve broken the door.”
‘I moved the mat, closed the door and went back to bed,’ she said, bewildered. I have a sneaking suspicion that Marcey may be
right. On one level, Ed has a computer-like brain. And he can be fun. He joined in when the kids played ‘Tiggy Off Ground’ [a chasing game where you have to keep your feet off the ground].
But he struggles with everyday challenges and seems to know little about the values or lifestyles of ordinary working-class people.
ED FORGETS HIS OWN ‘NAME’
Monday, March 7 – Our house I have a meeting tonight at The Salutation pub with a union official. Ed wants to come but I say no. The official might rumble me for supporting a candidate despite my official mayoral impartiality. He might smell a rat if we turn up with a polished young man who looks like David Miliband (who was then much better known than Ed).
I relent and say he can come. But to be safe, we need to have a pseudonym for Ed – at least until it becomes public knowledge that he is seeking the Labour nomination.
I suggest he should be a friend called James or Jim.
‘I don’t particularly feel like a Jim,’ says Ed.
‘No, but you’re definitely a James,’ I respond. ‘Yes… but Jim?’ ‘What d’you want to be called? Butch? Woody?’ I joke.
‘What about Vladimir?’ a Labour colleague who was with me laughs. ‘Or Karl – with a K of course.’ ‘Or Friedrich?’ ‘OK, OK, I get it!’ says Ed.
6pm – Salutation Pub
I have told Ed to stay in the car where Carolyne is, regardless of what she does.
What happens? When she comes into the pub, he follows her.
After about an hour into our meeting, the union official breaks off: ‘Is that your wife over there, Martin?’
I glance over at the bar and am horrified to see Carolyne with Ed.
‘Looks like she’s pulled,’ he adds, indicating Ed, who is standing next to her.
‘Ha…’ I laugh nervously. ‘That’s Jim… who she’s been working with.’
‘Aren’t you gonna shout her over then?’ the official asks me, beckoning to Carolyne. Over she comes with Ed. ‘Hi there… we’ve just finished,’ she says, passing the ball to me.
‘Well, let’s be getting off then,’ I say, finishing my drink.
‘Are we dropping Jim off?’ I ask, gesturing furtively towards Ed. Carolyne mouths: ‘Yes.’ ‘Did he just call me Jim?’ Ed asks my Labour friend. I jump up to divert attention. ‘Why did he just call me Jim?’ I hear Ed ask again. I’m beginning to worry about Ed. He just doesn’t get it.
Ed appears to exist in a vacuum as a member of the political class, brought up as one of two ‘princes’ with no real-world experience outside academic discourse. It is hard to detect any hinterland, interests or knowledge of anything outside politics.
I hurry us towards the door – just managing to get outside without further problems.
ED SETS FIRE TO HIMSELF…
Tuesday, March 8, 11.45pm – Our house I have just arrived home. The children are in bed and Carolyne is in the living room. I ask where Ed is and she says he’s working in my office at the bottom of the garden.
It is a brick summerhouse with a desk, computers, telephones and swivel chairs.
It’s a bitterly cold evening and I go to ask him whether he wants a coffee and to see how he’s doing.
As I walk down the garden path, I wave and signal that I’m making a brew but he appears deep in thought.
As I come closer, I nod and smile at him but things just don’t seem right. He doesn’t acknowledge me and is slumped in the chair.
As I step onto the veranda of the summerhouse I can see through the window that his eyes look terrible, as if I’ve woken him up from a snooze.
I make a fuss of him as I open the door. ‘Have I woken you up?’ I joke.
He stares at me, my mind is racing; there’s a disgusting acrid smell. ‘What, oh, it’s you,’ he finally says.
‘What have you done?’ I shout and, as I look down, I can see what he’s done.
For some reason he has moved a convection heater, which stands on two bricks, into the middle of the room. It is melting through the synthetic carpet, releasing toxic chemicals into the room.
‘For Christ’s sake, get out!’ I shout, but he’s not listening – he’s lethargic. ‘Get out!’ I shout. ‘You’ll kill yourself.’
I kick the convection heater on to its back and reveal a large hole burnt through both the carpet and its underlay.
I grab his chair, swing it round and drive it towards the door.
As the chair’s feet hit the threshold, the chair stops dead, catapulting Ed on to the veranda. He’s dazed.
‘Carolyne, I need your help,’ I shout as I get him a glass of water.
She joins me and we sit with Ed in the garden. We wonder whether we should take him to hospital for a check-up.
‘I think you’re over-reacting a tad,’ says Ed, by now coming round. ‘Well, I don’t think so,’ I say, like an overprotective parent.
‘Well, he’s not even living here… officially, is he?’ adds Carolyne. ‘What would you do if he died?’
‘What would you have done with me?’ asks Ed, feigning upset.
‘Well “they” wouldn’t have found you here,’ I say, marvelling at the callous (and tongue in cheek!) scenario I’m painting of moving his body.
We agree it will probably be safe for him to go to bed without a medical examination. He’s only
been here for a few days, but he’s already giving us more grief than our three lively children put together. He can’t open a door and turns himself into a one-man fire hazard the moment he is left alone.
Wednesday, March 9 Ed joins us all for breakfast – so we haven’t killed him, or should I say he hasn’t poisoned himself! Nine months later: Saturday, December 17 – Our House Ed rings me in the morning and asks whether he can pop in to see Carolyne and me.
He has a Christmas card and two wrapped presents, one for me and another which he says is a gift for Carolyne as compensation for the burnt carpet!
Carolyne and I wave Ed off and then open our ‘presents’.
Mine – a pair of two boxed ‘House of Commons Whiskey Glasses’. A nice thought, Ed, but I don’t drink.
Carolyne’s ‘present’ is a small rug, which Ed says she can use to put over the ‘accident-damaged’ hole in my office carpet. To us, it looks suspiciously like a prayer mat. (Subsequently, we are told it is indeed an Islamic prayer mat, with special padding for the elderly or infirm.)
This seems a strange present, given that it is to be used to put our dirty feet on. What if we had been Muslims? What if we had put it in our office, which is connected to our house across a garden path that gets muddy in the rain? It doesn’t bear thinking about.
Rather than treat the prayer mat disrespectfully, we store it with some of our other cherished possessions. Can anyone imagine Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, John Smith, Margaret Thatcher or John Major making that kind of mistake? Exactly.
MARCEY, AGED 10, GIVES ED A
TOUGH LESSON IN ECONOMICS
Wednesday, March 9, 2005, 7.15am – Our house Ed is procrastinating over his ‘Candidate’s Address’ letter, which must be printed by Wednesday and posted by Saturday.
I tell him that our children’s mail-out system is more efficient than a Henry Ford factory.
‘One folds the letter, one packs it in the envelope and one labels it. But you’ll have to pay ’em – Thatcher’s children and all that.
‘You’ll need to talk to them about when they’ve got time, because they’ve got school, homework, ballet and football.
‘And the letters need to be handwritten by you.’ ‘Handwritten!’ he replies, aghast. ‘Not the entire letter,’ I say, astonished he could think I meant he had to write every word. ‘Just the names – “Dear John or Joan” and the “Many thanks, Ed” bits.’ He goes to find the children. I sit down with Carolyne on the foot of the stairs and the children stand in the entrance to their playroom – now Ed’s bedroom.
Ed stands in the hallway and makes his pitch, saying: ‘Your daddy tells me you have a system for undertaking mail-outs – will you do a run of 750 for me?’ ‘Yes, we do it all the time, Ed,’ says Beth. ‘How much will you charge me?’ The children, who by now are bristling (again) at his rather patronising tone, go into a huddle in their ‘Bat Cave’ (a Batmanthemed corridor that connected the playroom to the bathroom). An ominous sign.
When they return, Marcey smiles under er her big, blue, almond-shaped eyes. s. ‘What do you want mailing out and when for?’
‘A letter and a CV by Saturday lunchtime,’ says Ed.
‘That’ll be £5 a sheet,’ says Marcey.
‘What about £2?’ he responds.
‘£5,’ says Marcey. At which point Ed makes hi his first mistake.
‘That’s more than you charge your daddy.’ ‘£5,’ repeats Marcey. ‘That’s a lot more than you normally charge your dad,’ restates Ed, dropping the daddy b bit now he realises he’s in for a harder negotiation than he thought.
‘Yes, but he’s our Dad,’ says Joss. ‘And we use his equipment.’
‘And he gives us more than 24 hours’ notice,’ adds Beth. ‘What about £3?’ ‘N ‘No. It goes up the closer we get to Friday,’ replies M Marcey.
‘£4 is my last offer,’ says Ed.
‘We’ve got to go to school now,’ says Marcey and le leads the other two ou out of the room. ‘T ‘They’re like hardbitten businessmen,’ Ed sa says, laughing and resignedi to defeat.
‘I’ll pay £5 and learn a valuable lesson.’ He ends up paying them nearly £400 for two lots of leaflets.
As we go back into the kitchen, Carolyne says: ‘I can’t believe that Marcey’s just turned over the chief economic adviser to Gordon Brown.’
If he can’t cope with our Marcey, how’s he going to cope when it’s Vladimir Putin on the other side of the negotiating table?
8am I tell Ed he needs to print the 750 leaflets today. I suggest that the letter be in colour and the CV in black and white.
He goes to his room and brings out some beautiful high-density card. I tell him there is no way my printer will be able to cope with that density. Ed has already bought eight packets of the high-density card so I agree to try to use it. 11.15pm Ed signs off his CV, hands it to me – and goes to bed, doubtless dreaming of No 10. I work through the night getting the
job done. Thursday, March 10, 4.30am Having printed fewer than 100 of Ed’s high-density CVs, the machine burns out.
4.30pm Carolyne returns from Leicester with a new printer at £987.00 – paid for by us. Ed barely acknowledges the arrival of the printer, never mind offering to help pay for it. In all the time he was with us, we did everything for him but he never even had the courtesy to take us out for dinner – even though he was always telling us he would. When, later, I complained he hadn’t repaid us for everything we had done for him, he said: ‘How much do I owe you? Will £3,000 cover it?’
I couldn’t believe it. I told him it was an insult and that paying us back was about more than money. He just didn’t get it.
6pm With a hastily assembled team of party workers, we begin handsigning Ed’s leaflets for him. The children start their production line.
9.30pm We finally finish hand-signing Ed’s leaflets.
‘IS MY BROTHER BETTER
LOOKING THAN ME?’
Monday March 14, 10.30pm Our house Ed has called Carolyne into the living room. His brother David is on Newsnight and Ed wants her perspective on it.
David is acquitting himself quite well, countering the interviewer’s points and asserting a strong Government line. Ed is suitably complimentary.
‘My father used to get so frustrated with him when we were young…’ he ventures unprompted.
‘All David wanted to do was to play football all the time. In fact, he wanted to be a professional footballer for quite some time.’
‘Is he athletic? Because he looks athletic,’ says Carolyne. He replies: ‘He’s more athletic than I am – when I was young I had problems with my feet.’
Ed asks Carolyne: ‘Do you think he’s better looking than me?’
Carolyne keeps her eyes fixed on the TV, buying herself some time to avoid answering. ‘Er, does he normally wear glasses?’
‘Yes, he does,’ says Ed. ‘He’s wearing his contacts now, which he doesn’t like doing.’
‘Yes… he’s got that look of someone who normally wears glasses,’ replies Carolyne, smartly moving the conversation on.
NEXT WEEK ED GETS TRAPPED IN THE GARDEN, IS OAR-STRUCK BY PRINCE CHARLES IN THE FLOODS... AND BRINGS HOUSE DOWN AT BINGO (NOT IN A GOOD WAY!)