'MASTER, Master, I have the solution" the Westminster researcher cried, "I know how we can make the Scotch (sic) finally love us."
The archetypal bespectacled policy wonk, spotty, white-socked and completely detached from reality, threw himself prostrate at the Scottish Tory's feet.
"We can save the Scottish pounds, we can be the patriotic saviours of Scottish banknotes, jus
t like Sir Walter Scott we can revive Tory prospects on the back of the banks' misfortune!"
Mundell, the shadowy Shadow Scottish Secretary swivelled round in his chair, stroking the white fluffy cat, his peering eyes struggling to keep up with the G-force of such physical exertion.
"What? There's an alternative to Paw Broon's recipe of bailing the banks out again (and again) and printing money like Mugabe on speed?"
He chuckled malevolently, sounding like Vincent Price with a bad cold.
"No, master! The Scottish people don't trust us Tories; we may have sold them their council houses for practically nothing, liberated them from metal bashing and the certain death of deep coal mines – but they hanker for that dirty, difficult past that defined being Scottish."
"We must do something that defines us as Scottish. We must save the Scottish pound – using your eighth position in the Private Members' Bill draw to make it legal tender."
Sitting up from his Yoga exercise, the blood drained from Mundell's feet into his brain and he had an epiphany.
"You're right, that's it! We can show the Scottish people that while they are losing their jobs, while they are losing their houses, while they are being evicted like Tommy Sheridan, that we, the Scottish Tories, are in touch with them. We shall do everything to save their banknotes."
The two political plotters burnt a hole in the thick-pile Westminster carpet as they danced a celebratory jig as only Scottish Tories knew how.
A month later there was a large knock at Mundell's Commons Room. The Scottish Tory, once a Social Democrat Councillor when David Owen was the coming man but now a Cameronite – this year at least – opened the door. There, ashen-faced and shaking was Paw Broon himself.
"We need to talk." He marched brusquely in and sat himself down.
"You have to withdraw your Private Members' Bill. We unionists can't risk it. You have to find a way to make it disappear."
"What do you mean? I'm only asking that Scottish pound notes be treated the same as Bank of England pound notes," pleaded Mundell.
The shadowy shadow was dumbfounded, he hadn't been treated like this since Annabelle threw one of her Paris Buns at him. Here was the Prime Minister – a proud Scot, a son of the manse, the Official Saviour of the World (etc, etc, yawn, yawn) – telling him that his Private Members' Bill to make Scottish banknotes legal tender across the British Isles should disappear! But why?
Broon's jaw dropped incessantly as he explained. "All it will take is an amendment from some backbench troublemaker to say we should also accept US dollars, Norwegian kroner or Swiss francs as legal tender and the floodgates will open.
"Of course the amendment would fail but people will waken up to the fact that if we had competing currencies inside the country the pound would be up the swanny, kaput, morte, finito. British or Scottish notes, the Pound Sterling would be dead. They would see how much we had debased and devalued the currency, inflated the money supply and prostituted our public finances in the false hope that we could repay our debts later.
"They would want their salaries paid in US dollars and even, mistakenly, euros." (At the mention of euros they both laughed dismissively, believing it was about to fall off a bigger cliff than the pound had).
Mundell was distraught. He had never bargained on upsetting anyone, he just wanted some publicity that might keep his seat and win the adulation of the Scottish press. Grudgingly he agreed and Paw Broon left. He pressed the red button and the filing cabinet sank into the floor and a satellite tracking console rose replacing it and the signed portrait of Michael Heseltine flipped over to reveal a flashing plasma screen showing the world. It was back to the drawing board.
Pay them in RBS notesJUST how mad is the world becoming? Northern Rock crashes, instead of selling it to Richard Branson or letting it fold, the Government nationalises it with taxpayers' money. Now its staff are to be given a £2000 bonus, with more payments promised later.
If they have to be paid give it to them in Royal Bank one pound notes. They might get 80p to the pound in Geordieland if they hurry.
