Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary Jeremy Hunt was in an upbeat mood this morning as he announced sweeping changes to the country’s diplomatic service.
”Those fussy, sluggish, pointless careerists, the so called diplomats are out, and people who know how to get deals done are in,” he said as giddy as a boy in a candy store, “for too long British reputation abroad has been mismanaged by people who studied, trained and served as ambassadors, but that changes, just like the NHS changed under me, so too the FCO is.”
It seems the idea for change has long been festering in the curious little box he calls his mind.
”Look at the great deals businessmen cut with me to carve up the NHS piecemeal and look how they’re getting away with it? You think businessmen can’t make a better fist of being ambassadors? Certainly Branson will get the trade deals done. Look how he gets trains done! Better a proven British leg end than some guy no one has ever heard of who’s sweated out a decade in Angola hoping to get promoted to somewhere in the EU!”
The change will also help pave the way for the direction Mr Hunt wants to take the FCO in.
”We’ll not be bothering with nation states anymore,” he added, “we’re going to send ambassadors straight to the world’s multinationals and skip out the middlemen, with the exception of Saudi Arabia of course, they buy our bombs and help keep the party going.”
So who is picked for the plum job in Riyadh?
“Wetherspoons’ boss Tim Martin has kindly accepted my offer of the position of U.K. ambassador to Saudi Arabia. With his proven experience of getting deals done with the religious fanatics behind Brexit, he’ll get the job done. I predict before his time is up there’ll be a drive through Wetherspoons pub on every street corner in Saudi and it’ll be the ladies who are driving through them.”
Good luck Jeremy Hunt. Whenever the country needs something that rhymes with something else, you’re the one we turn to.