Gaffe

I love it. An unguarded word in private about a stubborn woman the PM has encountered on the campaign trail and suddenly it's 'Now we see the real Brown.' No. We knew that's what he was like. We're not stupid. We even knew before reading Andrew Rawnsley's interesting book about New Labour. 'Cos you could just tell, that's how.

The villains of this piece, in my mind, are the reporters who felt duty bound, duty bloody bound, to make sure that the woman who was insulted in private, out of her hearing and not for her consumption was informed of the insult and asked to comment on it.

Get this. From time to time the parishioners of Nailsea, even the sick, lonely and bereaved ones, have been the subject of verbal abuse, by me, behind closed doors. It doesn't mean I don't want the best for them. It doesn't mean I hate them. It means I wait until the doors are closed. I do that for a reason. Just in case any of you (them) are offended, I apologise now. You probably weren't what I called you but I felt better once I'd done it.

Let him, or her, who has never mouthed off in private about someone who was a bit of pain, albeit a well-intentioned one, cast the first stone.