Yeah, I thought that. Furthermore, I would have thought that NOT being one of the three most hated professions in the world (the other being estate agents) would have been a positive boon.

BTW. It is ABSOLUTELY NOT a 9-5 job. Granted it is less flexible than some would like, but it actually starts pretty early in the day and last division isn't until 10pm. You do get Fridays off, but you'd be travelling home to do constituency surgeries on Friday and all weekend, then travelling back down for Monday.

They have got themselves a bad press by being a shower of greedy swine in a minority of cases. But in general they work very very hard. And of course, Gareth dear boy, that would be your aim too ... wouldn't it!! So no reason not to stand.

I seem to remember a thread on voting for an Aspie a few months back. Well, here's the way to test the hypothesis! Except nominations have closed I think.

I might be in a better position to try next election, might give it a shot then.

After the MPs expenses scandal last summer, I decided I probably wouldn’t vote.  Not that the economy’s in good shape, but I thought a hung parliament might give everyone a good kick up the a** - so perhaps I’d vote LibDem after all.  

But today’s papers and news sites are leading with stories of £750 paid monthly into the bank account of Nick Clegg prior to him becoming party leader.  All expenses were claimed back through the correct channels, so the money wasn’t for anything along those lines.  (That he used to be a lobbyist by profession doesn’t impress me – nor the fact that he worked for a lobbying group that successfully got a change in the law that made life easier for Royal Bank of Scotland.)  Anything to do with lobbying’s as bad as anything to do with expenses fiddles.  Granted, the timing of the story – leaked on the day he is going live again – is highly suspicious.

Not that she’s in my constituency, but I hope Esther Rantzen wins that seat in Luton.  She’s clearly making a lot of people in parliament very nervous about her journalistic background and long standing relationship with the BBC.

I don’t care how politics gets cleaned up, but cleaning up it needs.  And the likes of Martin Bell and Esther Rantzen certainly make the rest look over their shoulders.  That can’t be a bad thing.