Brussel sprouts

Let me be the first minister to wish you all a Merry Christmas. And for those of you fortunate enough to be working in grocery retail, congratulations on not joining the 40,000 colleagues unexpectedly seeking exciting new opportunities following Spreadsheet Phil’s enlightened plan to Save The High Street.

Yes it’s good to see everyone getting into the spirit. Aldi, I hear, is giving away all of its unsold food on Christmas Eve. Nice touch, and heartwarming to see that at least some of its customers will be getting their money’s worth. See what I did there?

The vegan lobby are out in force, too, campaigning to get politicians to wear plastic sandals and bathe in tofu for all of January. Of course I’ll join in, darlings, on the sole condition that Brexit remains on track. There, that should get me off the hook. Mung bean curd doesn’t really agree with me - I wouldn’t want to spend the month locked in the Frexit powder room.

Talking of which, heaven knows where everything is going in Westminster. I popped over to No 10 to see if I could offer any moral support, and noticed that poor Theresa’s pancake foundation is cracking. The sinister smile is still in place, though.

To cap it all, when I returned to Frexit HQ, my assistant George was sitting rather shamefacedly in a gaseous fug evidently of his own making. I was about to send him to the GP when I spotted the bag of Walkers sprout-flavoured crisps open on his desk. The effect is much the same, and in any case it wouldn’t be the only foul odour emanating from Brussels recently! Jingle bells!