THE world’s leaders met in Azerbaijan this week.
And after their private jets had swerved round the puddles of crude oil that literally seep out of the ground in this part of the world, they sat down to discuss how global warming can be kept in check.
Actually, when I say world leaders, I don’t mean Trump, obviously.
He wasn’t there.
And nor was Xi Jinping from China, or Narendra Modi from India or Putin from Russia. Or even Macron from France.
So saying it was a conference for world leaders is the same as saying you’re hosting a gathering of global rock bands. Without the Stones, U2, The Who or Led Zep.
I’ll tell you who was there though. Showaddywaddy. In the shape of Sir Starmer and his Baldrick, Ed Miliband.
Most of the other presidents and prime ministers had stayed away because they knew full well that it wouldn’t be a conference about climate change at all.
Instead, it would just be a lot of leaders from the developing world saying they can’t do anything about global warming unless the West gives them £100trillion, and their wives some jewels.
Even Greta Thunberg realised this whole that thing was a con and instead of standing outside the conference hall with a banner, she went to the neighbouring state of Georgia where she appeared in a Palestinian keffiyeh in a crowd of people chanting about veganism.
Not quite sure what their message was. Or indeed how she got there from Sweden. Maybe she walked?
But whatever, Starmer stood up and said to the room that Britain has many plans for raising taxes to meet Baldrick’s exciting net zero targets, and everyone in the room said, “Who is this man?”
And “Why’s he banging on about solar and wind power when he’s from a country which, in the whole month of October, had neither”.
“Give us your money,” they yelled, silently.
Starmer, of course, was virtue signalling. Saying to the eight people back home who still support him that he’s got their back.
And that his Baldrick has targets.
Other than this, his presence was a complete waste of time.
So what, then, was the point of this sub-sea level chinwag on the banks of the Caspian Sea?
Who benefitted? Well, the local hotels will certainly have shifted a lot of locally sourced caviar, the airport will have sold a hundred tons of fuel for all the jets, and Baku’s night ladies are sure to have done a roaring trade.
The weather, meanwhile, will continue to become ever more bonkers.
And people will continue to believe that if they take their own bag to the supermarket, they will make a realistic difference.
THE burglar who used a ladder to get into Raheem Sterling’s house while the footballer was playing in the World Cup has been banged up for nearly 13 years.
Which means he’ll be out in two months because they need his cell for someone who’s sent a hurty tweet.
That’s not a surprise.
What is a surprise is that while in Raheem’s house, he stole ten Rolex watches.
Why would anyone want ten watches?
And why would they all be from the same maker? And why Rolex?
As I’ve always said, there is only one thing in the world worse than a fake Rolex.
And that’s a real one. So it’s good news for Raheem. Because now he doesn’t have one.
FIGURES just in show that thanks to the dreadful summer and even worse winter, Britain has just experienced the second worst harvest on record.
That’s bad news for the nation’s farmers. But at least they know Starmer’s government has got their backs.
No wait. Hang on. They haven’t. So C U Next Tuesday.
Hugh Corcoran, a London restaurateur who only serves food at lunchtime, has laid into customers who share a starter, drink only tap water and don’t leave for hours.
I’m with him on this. A restaurant is not a park bench. It’s not a library.
Your job as a customer is to respect the fact that the owner is not providing a social service and if you just sit there, you are literally stealing his time and his electricity.
So order a bottle of wine and then another and then fill your face with his food while sinking a third.
There’s been a lot of talk all week about whether Justin Welby, who resigned this week as Archbishop of Canterbury, knew that the barrister and evangelical Christian, John Smyth, was routinely savaging young boys in his care.
Even though it’s hard to make the dates add up, Justin Welby has always denied being aware of Smyth’s horrific hobby.
Hmmm. The man ran Christian camps for young boys. That’s a warning sign right there, surely. And then look at that comb over.
This is something I always find difficult.
When someone is done for this kind of offence, you look at him and think, how the bloody hell did we not know?
I mean Jimmy Savile, for crying out loud. What were we all thinking of?
IF you log on to the internet, there are many things to see and do.
So what in the name of all that’s holy possessed two women to go online and pay a man in Indonesia to torture a monkey on camera?
They didn’t even know one another.
Which means two separate women decided one day that they were bored with self-help podcasts and re-runs of Minder and videos of people falling over and that they wanted to watch live footage of a baby long-tailed macaque monkey being tortured and killed.
Viewers were even invited to make suggestions on what sort of torture they’d like to see.
You’ll be relieved to hear that Adriana Orme, from Upton-upon-Severn, Worcs, and Holly Le Gresley, from Kidderminster received lengthy jail sentences.
I hope their time inside is particularly gruesome.
It’s often said that the weirdest country on Earth is Turkmenistan.
All of the buildings have to be white. Black cars are forbidden.
Video games are banned. It is illegal to listen to the radio. And young men are not allowed to have a beard.
Mind you, Turkmenistan looks like Canada compared with the lunacy you find in Wales these days.
The latest wheeze from the government who insisted you drive at walking speed, is this: Dogs should be banned from parts of the countryside because they are racist.
I’m not making this up. Taxpayers’ cash has been used to produce a report which says more people from ethnic minorities would visit rural areas if there were no dogs.
Why? I have two dogs that are not in the least bit racist. I’ve seen them chasing black people, making barky noises with their heckles up. But I’ve also seen them chasing a family of Norwegians in a similar fashion.
Other things they chase include pheasants, deer, muntjac, rabbits and, rather pointlessly, hares. I think once, they chased James Blunt.
So they’re not even species-ist.
We know that after 14 years in power, the Tories lost their sense of purpose and direction.
But Labour has been in power in Wales for a hundred years. And as a result, they’ve gone full-on Turkmenistan.
So watch out, Owen. Because after they’ve executed your dog, they’ll make you shave your beard off.
