Brown’s green holiday plans

News in this week: Gordon Brown is on holiday. Not content with a week in a Tuscan villa at one of Uncle Silvio’s saucy ‘spezziale’ parties, Brown is facing down the press with the thought that he may spend his down time dry stone walling.

I’m not sure how many people really know what that is. For readers who haven’t kept livestock in the British uplands, dry stone walling is when you pick up bits of stone and balance them on top of each other. You do this to a certain height, for miles. And miles. And miles.

There’s a good reason why people started using fencing, you know. Dry stone walling is about as interesting as “Peter Andre’s top ten sandwich fillings: the musical. On Ice.” Contrast our PM with that of the Russian peoples. Black belt judo master and ex-spymaster Vladimir Putin is already pretty interesting. The fact that on his hols he likes to wade through freezing rivers with his top off for the cameras is nothing short of remarkable.

While I’m not suggesting Gordo should pop his vest off mid-stone-wall, I do think that he could at least make an effort to whip up some kind of interest in volunteer work. Putin, for all his Timothy-Dalton-Era-James-Bond-baddie image, has at least managed to marry his leisure time with press-pleasing activities in his nation’s countryside. He’s doing things that might inspire the handful of sober Putin supporters to go out an enjoy their time responsibly – and interestingly.

So, here’s a few ideas I’d like to lobby Parliament with. Let’s get Gordon to take an eco-friendly, macho holiday next time…

1.    Tracking newly-released boars in the Scottish Highlands with Ray Mears
2.    Swimming to an offshore wind farm in his pants and checking the fuses
3.    Stalking grey squirrels and putting them in sacks while dressed as Rambo
4.    Using a big axe to make carbon-neutral woodchip fuel. Topless. Come on,
he might as well pop the top off once.

Ed Chipperfield

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