Before I start on the subject, let me apologise for the finger trouble I had yesterday when trying to add to my Zambezi Walk Page. Somehow the piece and pictures ended up as a rant but thanks to Daughter in Law, Gillian I know how to do things properly now – I hope!

Just ignore the bit about The Source. You can see it and more on the Zambezi Walk page.

Back to politics and politicians.

Do you realise that we still have another four weeks of this utterly pathetic and pointless name calling between Johnson and Hunt to endure? There are only a hundred and sixty thousand people eligible to vote. Why then does it take this long to pick a successor for the hapless Mrs Maybe? It could and should all have been over in a week to ten days. What a pathetic farce politics is becoming.

I listened to Ann Widdecombe making her first speech to the European parliament in Strasbourg on Thursday and couldn’t help admiring the old trout for her fiery oratory. Standing next to Farage, she ranted about the ‘undemocratic’ European Union and said: “It’s a great honour to speak on behalf of the largest single party in this place.

 ‘And may I say, if I needed any convincing at all that the best thing for Britain is to leave here as soon as possible, it was the way those elections were conducted yesterday.”

She was referring of course to the so-called ‘elections’ to replace European Union leaders such as Juncker and Tusk.

“If that is this place’s idea of democracy, that is a serious betrayal of every country that is represented here.”

She added: “That is just one of many reasons why Britain is right to be leaving this place, hopefully on Halloween.

‘It is right because there is a pattern consistent throughout history of oppressed people turning on the oppressors. Slaves against their owners, the peasantry against the feudal barons. Colonies against their empires and that is why Britain is leaving.”

I know I am a dodo but I thought that was rather apt, but the reaction from the London twitterati was probably predictable. Mentioning slaves was surely racist – wasn’t it? Of course it ruddy wasn’t but I listened to Question Time yesterday (I can’t stay up late enough to listen live!) and her speech was mentioned with utter disgust by two of the left-leaning members of the panel.

One of these harridans was Sian Berry, a simperingly smug lady who is apparently the co leader of the Green Party. A ‘co leader?’ Don’t the Greens have enough gumption about them to elect a single boss? Had I ever thought of voting for them (which I haven’t) the knowledge that they have two – perhaps more? – leaders would put me off immediately.

There was also a young journalist called Tom Harwood on the panel and he was the only Brexit supporting speaker there. He was good too and frequently showed up his fellow panel members for the blinkered pratwinkles that they were.

I have digressed a bit so back to Ann Widdecombe and Europe. The European Union is an utterly appalling organisation by any standards. Way back in the seventies, the late Tony Benn, a firebrand cabinet minister at the time visited what was then the European Commission in Brussels. He later wrote in his diary,

‘I felt as if I was a slave going to Rome. The whole relationship was wrong. Here was I, an elected man who could be removed, and here were these people with more power than I had and no accountability to anyone.’

I didn’t like Mr Benn much (a long story for another day) but he was right and since those days, the European Union has grown into a vast, bureaucratic monolith that cares nothing about national identities and freedoms. It is still an unaccountable, unelected cabal, chosen through bargaining, favours (I won’t say bribes) and cynical stitch-ups rather than by the ballot box. As Ann Widdecombe pointed out, we have witnessed that this week with days of private argument as to who will fill the leaky shoes of Juncker, Tusk and company when they leave in September. Based on rampant cronyism rather than respect for democracy, the process was an unedifying as Juncker’s staggering leadership. Given the importance of these roles, especially that of the EU presidency, the selections should have been carried out in an open, transparent manner.

Instead, the business was conducted entirely behind closed doors. This is grubby politics at its worst and for me brings back shades of Bob Mugabe and his Zanu (PF) thugs. They don’t care about democracy either.

Why on earth any thinking Briton wants to remain part of this horrible set up is completely beyond me.