Payback Time

In 1997, at the fag-end of the seven-year fag-end that followed Margaret Thatcher's removal from power, the British Conservative Party was roused to its usual fever of moral indignation at the thought of abiding by an international treaty. Unfortunately, the greatest country in the world (the United Kingdom, for those who came in late) did not have American permission to use its independent nuclear deterrent on Beijing; so with much indignant spluttering about rights which the British had somehow neglected to grant the natives over the preceding ninety-eight and a half years, the Queen Gawblesser's very own procurator Ruritanicus had to hand over his little colony, and apparently the poor old thing has never quite got over the shock. It would be uncharitable in the extreme to suggest that Baron Patten of Barnes feels a sneaking envy of his former boss, a political vacuum now ludicrously sucked up by the media as some sort of elder statesman; though certainly in the present state of political rationality there seems little reason why a pair of eyes like cold poached eggs dipped in a weak solution of blackcurrant juice should not ooze as much charisma as any personal advantage of John Major's.

In any case, and doubtless from none but the noblest motives, Baron Patten of Barnes has been bleating about Hong Kong for the past quarter of a century, and the fact that the present pandemic originated among the Heathen Chinee has afforded him an unparalleled opportunity to go full Trumpster and insist on a full and intrusive examination. His Lordship wished to make clear from the outset that his problem was not with China or the Chinese people, but only with the Chinese government, which the Baron apparently believes should be bypassed, or possibly sent a gunboat or so, in order that Britain may attain a more meaningful and fulfilling relationship with the real China. His Lordship dislikes totalitarian régimes, which rely on secrecy and mendacity, quite unlike Her Majesty's Government or the Parliamentary Brexit Party. The dangerous and immoral Communist Party has tried to shut doctors up and does not appear to care about public health or international law, quite unlike Her Majesty's Government or the Parliamentary Brexit Party. The Heathen Chinee even appear to be prejudiced against both autonomous local government and inspections by foreign powers, which are famously among Her Majesty's Government's and the Parliamentary Brexit Party's two very favourite things. Still, his Lordship does not appear to have called out the Chinese government for its persecution of Muslims, so perhaps even the Chinese Communist Party has at least one redeeming feature.