The day I took an egg for Ed

I know how Nigel Farage feels. Well, near enough. I’ve never been drenched with milkshake. But I have been pelted with egg.

It was the summer of 2013, and I was following Ed Miliband as he strolled through a market in south London, beaming at voters and shaking hands. All was going well.

Until, that is, I heard a peculiar noise. It was a faint, damp slap. And it seemed to have come from the side of my head.

I swung round. Someone, I couldn’t see who, had flung an egg at the Labour leader. Unfortunately, they’d missed him. And hit me instead.

The thing I remember most clearly – apart from the smell, and the stickiness, and the feel of the yolk oozing slowly down into my ear – is the sheer volume of it. Mr Miliband’s would-be assailant had thrown only one egg. Yet, to look at me, you’d have thought they’d thrown a whole carton. I was absolutely plastered in gunk. It was in my hair, and on my face, and on my left shoulder, and down my back, and down my left sleeve, and down my tie – and even, somehow, down the back of my left trouser leg. It would have been an excellent shot, had it actually been meant for me.

Mr Miliband may have escaped that time, but he was successfully egged on at least two other occasions during his time as Labour leader. The interesting thing, looking back, is how well he took it. He didn’t howl, or rage, or use it as an opportunity to denounce his political adversaries in general. He would simply smile, make a self-deprecating joke of it, and get on with his day’s campaigning, as if nothing had happened.

In retrospect, the wider reaction was interesting, too. No one ever suggested that egging Mr Miliband was a threat to democracy, or to freedom of speech. No one acted as if it were a terrorist attack, or an assassination attempt. It was just some idiot, throwing an egg. That was all. What could you do? When you were out campaigning, there was always going to be the odd idiot. Hardly worth dwelling on.

Six years ago, it was. We were made of strong stuff, in those days.

Trials of a PC parent

It’s not easy, being a modern father. You try to be liberal. You try to be progressive. You try to teach open-mindedness, and tolerance, and the importance of equality.

The trouble is: children these days can be so reactionary.

“Dada,” announced my five-year-old son the other day. “I don’t like pink.”

I asked him why.

“Because,” he said simply, “pink is for girls.”

Naturally, I couldn’t let this outrage stand. First, I explained sternly, pink was not “for girls”. Pink was for everyone, irrespective of gender or gender identity. Also: there was no such thing as a “girls’ colour”. Or, for that matter, a “boys’ colour”.

“Yes there is,” he said. “Blue is for boys.”

I was appalled. Where on earth was he getting this outdated, sexist, stereotypical rubbish? Certainly not from me.

“Look,” I said. “There’s nothing wrong with pink. And there’s nothing girly about it. In fact...”

“Mama wears pink,” he said.

“Well, sometimes. Not all the time though. Anyway...”

“You don’t wear pink.”

“Well. No, maybe not. Actually I did used to have a pink T-shirt. Before you were born. Well, about 15 years before you were born. But that’s not the point. The point is...”

“You wear blue.”

“OK, so this jumper just happens to be blue. But...”

“All your jumpers are blue.”

“Well, maybe they are, but that doesn’t mean...”

“Your suit is blue.”

“Look. I like blue. All right? But that’s not because I’m a boy. It’s because… Look, I just like blue. That’s all it is. Anyway. You’re missing Hey Duggee.”

Honestly. The youth of today. So conservative. So narrow-minded. So old-fashioned.

I just hope, in time, the boy will grow to be as tolerant, liberal and open-minded as I am.