I want M&S government.

I want M&S government. It’s not just ‘it’s not just…’, it’s more than that. I’m thinking food rather than wooden slacks and white shirts tailored for a court appearance. M&S food is aspirational. If I bought their food and cooked it to a cinder I would feel I’ve let the side down where a Netto pizza in the same state would hardly raise my emotional eyebrow. No I stand erect in M&S like a retired guardsman, defender of the realm. Compare that with buying a second hand car. I know they’ve bought an auction banger and polished it to within an inch of its life, put cornflower in the oil to thicken it up, had virgins sitting in it overnight so it smells nice and carefully painted the tread pattern on the tyres. I know if I bought it I’d be better off taking it straight to a garage to save the hassle of breaking down in the middle of nowhere; but it’s shiny and the man is ever so nice and tells me just what I want to hear. I even begin to feel sympathy for his ailing mother in law. In fact he’s so nice I somehow feel a ridiculous need to constantly check the presence of my wallet. And when he says he’ll clamp my car for parking on his forecourt if I don’t sign a 12 page HP agreement I somehow feel in a hostile environment. And even he doesn’t ask me to take a CRB check! “I’m sorry sir but I can’t allow you to buy this car in case you take young children out in it. We all know what that can lead to don’t we sir. Filthy rummaging about in knickers, undoing one’s….” Stop!! However I fight it I feel my mind following his drift from nobility to squalidity, decency to deception. So like my citizenship I walk away, my vote in my pocket, owning neither car nor my rightful place in society. If only M&S sold cars and did government. I might feel proud to be British again.