Tribunal

	Stephen M. and Phyllida sit behind a kind of bench as for a tribunal of 
	some kind. Stephen, rat-faced and moustached, is up before them.


Phyllida	You are Councillor Kenneth Wade?

Stephen		I am.

Stephen M.	I hope you are aware, Councillor Wade, that this is an informal
		hearing?

Stephen		Indeed. I would like it understood at the outset that I have
		done nothing of which I am ashamed and that I stand by my
		record in local government. Having said that I am very happy to
		co-operate fully with this enquiry and answer such questions as
		might be put.

Phyllida	You were elected to Grangely City Council, Mr Wade, on a ticket
		of ... let me see ...

Stephen		... on a ticket of providing value for money for our charge-
		paying customers and injecting new standards of decency, honour
		and family values into the community.

Stephen M.	Fine words, no doubt, Mr Wade. You were, I believe, in charge
		of the "contracting out" of the Council's cleaning services?

Stephen		Cleansing.

Stephen M.	I beg your pardon?

Stephen		Cleansing services. We call them cleansing services, not
		cleaning services.

Phyllida	Why?

Stephen		Um ... because it annoys people, I suppose.

Stephen M.	And the company you contracted those cleansing services out to
		was called Wade Cleaning Ltd.

Stephen		Cleansing. Wade Cleansing. Slogan: we know the Meansing of
		Cleansing.

Phyllida	Wade Cleansing is wholly owned and run by your wife.

Stephen		The matter has already been fully investigated by an
		independent enquiry ...

Stephen M.	Yes. Wade Independent Tribunals Ltd.

Stephen		Certainly. The old publicly-run enquiry procedures were
		expensive and inefficient, we contracted out to Wade
		Independent Tribunals Ltd, who offered a competitive, hard-
		headed, business-orientated tribunal and enquiry service.

Stephen M.	But which is wholly owned and run by your son, Geoffrey.

Stephen		As it happens, yes.

Stephen M.	Who is five months old.

Stephen		Five and a half months old. Geoffrey put together a very
		attractive bid. I was proud of him.

Stephen M.	Mm. Geoffrey's mother, however, is not your wife, but Miss
		Valerie Jephcott, your secretary.

Stephen		Yes. The sexual service my wife was offering was old-
		fashioned, inefficient, unwieldly and ... after my older
		children's birth ... overstreched and with a tendency to too
		much waste. I decided to contract out my sexual requirements,
		open them for competitive tender in the market-place. Valerie
		offered a sexual service that was faster, tighter, more
		efficient, more imaginative and more slimmed down than my
		wife's.

Phyllida	I thought you stood for family values and clean living?

Stephen		Cleanse living.

Phyllida	Cleanse living. In your electoral literature, for instance, you
		promised to come down hard on homosexuals.

Stephen		Since I've been in office I have spent a lot of money and
		energy coming down very hard indeed on homosexuals.

Stephen M.	To return to financial matters, Mr Wade. Do you think it is
		appropriate that in these very lean times for ...

Stephen		In these very lens times ...

Stephen M.	Whatever. The point is, you have been accused of making a lot
		of money from being a councillor.

Stephen		Yes. Well. There you have it: "accused". That's the attitude I
		have to deal with all the time. Making money is a crime,
		something to apologise for. Well, I'm sorry but when I grew up
		"profit" wasn't a dirty word. "Arse" was a dirty word. "Profit"
		wasn't. "Scrotum" was a pretty dirty word too and so was
		"titty". Well, I'm not ashamed to say that I've never been
		afraid of hard graft, sheer bloody graft ... or is "graft" a
		dirty word too, like "botty" and "helmet"?

Stephen M.	I think we've heard enough, Councillor. This may be an informal
		hearing, but frankly, I'm sure we're agreed ...

	He cocks his head at Phyllida.

Phyllida	No quarrels. It's all there.

Stephen M.	Yes. Yes. Uh-huh. Good. (To Stephen, solemnly.) Kenneth Wade.
		Your name will now go forward as that of our officially adopted
		Parliamentary Candidate for the Grangely Constituency.
		(Smiles.) Congratulations, Ken.

	Stephen comes up for a handshake. We see for the first time that we are 
	in the Meeting Room of the Grangely Conservative Constituency HQ.

Stephen M.	Long live Britain.

Stephen		God Save the Quense.