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“What are you saying? Of course we didn’t. The idea that I, or anyone who works in my office, would interfere or pressure the Justice Minister in her proper role as the guardian of the rule of law — so much as lift an eyebrow when she is in the room — is preposterous, insulting, and absolutely and without qualification FALSE. And to be doubly clear on this, I’d instantly fire anyone who even brought up a whisper of a suggestion of it.”

Apart from proving that I’ll never be a playwright, the above smidgen of invented response is meant to display how a party leader would naturally speak when a newspaper has questioned his honour and the honour of his government on a matter as profound as attempting to influence the course of justice or pressure a justice minister in her function as guardian of the rule of law.

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The denial would be energetic, spontaneously expressed, a rush of words thrown back at the questioner and directly addressing the point of the question.

The denial would be energetic, spontaneously expressed, a rush of words thrown back at the questioner

It would not be some bloodless sentence, exquisitely phrased, designed in committee by crisis-management teams, evasive and equivocal, and delivered in a frozen robotic monotone with all the passion of some of those painfully overacted Heritage Moments we lately hear so much about.