Port is fashionable once again

I once drank some excellent port at Ted Heath’s table. The invitation came as a surprise, but it almost certainly had nothing to do with the monstre (un)sacré. The dinner took place during a Bournemouth party conference at the Close in Salisbury. Ted had an unofficial PPS, a then Tory MP called Robert Hughes. Rob had a sense of fun and mischief. There would have been little scope for either while he was enduring the sullen maunderings of the Incredible Sulk. Anyway, he was given a chance to amuse himself when asked to organise a dinner party. He included me.

This would not have been Ted’s choice. I had never been polite about him in print, nor to him in person. But he was at one disadvantage. As I was not a head of state or even a head of government, I was hardly an interlocuteur valable for le grand épicier.