‘What’s your call about?’ said the switchboard operator at the Department for the Environment.
‘You don’t need to know that. Just please put me through. They’re expecting me.’
‘But I have to say what your call is about.’
‘Well, my call is about having just spoken to the minister and him not having time to talk to me and telling me to call his office so I can raise some important concerns with his people.’
‘What people?’
‘Well, I don’t know, do I? The people in his office. Look, just put me through.’
‘But I can’t put you through unless you tell me what it’s about.’
‘You have to put me through because I just spoke to the minister and he said to ring his office. I can ring Jim back and tell him you won’t put me through, if you like?’
‘Oh-wuw,’ she said like a petulant child. ‘Hold the line, then. I’ll have to…(tut…sigh…),’ and after a short time the line began ringing again.
‘Hello, can I ask what you’re calling about?’ said a different voice, equally suspicious.
‘Look, I just spoke to the minister and he’s very busy — there’s an election on, I believe — and I have some concerns about animal welfare and he said to call his office, so here I am.’
‘He said what?’
‘To call you.’
‘Why? What’s this about?’
And then it struck me. When the minister for animal welfare tells someone like me to call his office, what he means is ‘bugger off with your stupid questions about rabbits, you daft woman’. And to be honest, if I were him, I would probably do the same.
Trouble is, how am I ever going to get cross-party support for a new Bill to give protection to caged animals if I can’t speak to the Department of the Environment constructively about it? Naturally, as I’m a political journalist, and we’re six weeks from a general election, every time I ring they just think I’m trying to do something horrible to them.
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