PATER PATTER

TODAY IS FATHER’S DAY IN THE ANGLO-SAXON WORLD and so, at least in theory, fathers should be given a day off to get up to whatever they want without being bothered by their children, although Western consumer society tends to see things in a slightly different manner. Thus we have to pretend to enjoy receiving beer mugs with “The Best Daddy in the World”, “Who’s the Daddy” or “Daddy Cool” written on them, when I imagine that most fathers of decent standing would rather receive these offerings from their young mistresses than their children.

GEOGRAPHICAL CIRCUMSTANCES, if the expression is not a tautology, has seen me possessing the freedom to lounge about in the sun and drink Port and sparkling wine in a café this afternoon, rather than having to comply with the suggestion by my youngest that “on Father’s Day you can take me for dinner at McDonald’s™.

HOWEVER, UNLIKE OTHER FATHERS, our good leader David Cameron has decided to “speak out” in the Sunday Telegraph today, irate at the behaviour of some of the fathers in our nation. He has strongly stated that Britain should be a "genuinely hostile" place for runaway fathers, gentlemen who deserve, in his opinion, the "full force of shame heaped upon them" and are "beyond the pale".

IN DADDY CAMERON’S OPINION fathers who do not support their family are worse than drink drivers. This is an interesting comparison, and if Mr Cameron’s office looks into the statistics a little more clearly tomorrow morning they will find that in the most socially problematic areas of our country as many as half of the children do not know who their father is or indeed what a father is; one imagines that their fathers are in similar ignorance as to the whereabouts – or indeed very existence – of their children.

WHILST CLEVER ANALYSTS may want to point out that Mr Cameron’s well-timed but idiotically patronising remark may smack of racism, I would merely like to state that it once again shows that the Conservative and Unionist Party is always the first to stand up for the rights of bastards.