Westminster Hall  -  Michael Heseltine  , 1997

British ,  b.1961  -

Oil on canvas ,  94 x 81 cm.

(Dividers by @v6que )

'up there with heseltine brandishing the parliamentary mace' HUH!?

honestly. the bane of my existence is that this wasn't caught on film.

the year was 1976 and labour were in power. during a debate, a tory MP suggested that this one particular bill was a hybrid, which would basically change the way it's handled in parliament. the speaker accepted this, but the labour government disagreed and moved a motion to reverse the ruling. they had a debate on whether or not the bill was a hybrid, and the government won by 1 vote.

however a labour MP tom pendry participated in said vote even though he was supposed to be absent because of the convention of pairing (when an MP from one party can't make a vote due to illness or travel, sometimes an informal agreement is made where their opposite number would also be absent to make the numbers 'fair').

because of this, michael heseltine got very angry and removed the house of commons mace from its position on the table and advanced towards the government front bench. needless to say the sitting was suspended and then immediately adjourned. the 1970s was truly a wild time in uk politics.

just so you know: the house of commons can only lawfully operate when the mace is in place, so this was kind of a big deal.

just discovered that Michael Heseltine is 6’3 oh my god

A significant cross party political debate tonight

A significant cross party political debate tonight

At 6.30pm tonight there is going to be a once-in-a-lifetime cross-party ‘in conversation’ to reflect on an unprecedented decade. The event is taking place in London at The Magic Circle Theatre, 12 Stephenson Way, NW1 2HD. However it will also be broadcasted. The five people taking part are Michael Heseltine, Vince Cable, Andrew Adonis, Caroline Lucas and Anna Bird. The image shown here is from a…

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Mrs Thatcher made a lot of right calls in her time, but none more so than in what she chose to wear when she drove a tank for the cameras on a visit to British forces in West Germany. She was dressed in a rather fetching long white mac and matching headscarf. “I’m the Prime Minister,” she was saying, “not a squaddie. I’m not trying to pretend that I am doing their work.” 

If only there had been someone around to give some advice to Keir Starmer before he popped on television in military fatigues – while, for goodness sake, calling for a “sustainable ceasefire” in Gaza. 

No, Mr Starmer, you are a Labour leader auditioning to be PM; you are not leading a military junta. I can only hope there aren’t a few old majors out there in the nation’s retirement homes who saw the clip and have concluded that Starmer has just led a coup d’etat, and now won’t get out from under their beds. 

I can see the thinking behind it. Labour’s strategists know that defence is traditionally one of Labour’s weak points and they want to get the message across that their leader is pretty tough. Unlike some Labourites, he is not going to sit in his Downing Street bunker as nuclear missiles rain down on Britain and refuse to press the button on the grounds it is still worth talking to the enemy. 

But even so, it is pretty laughable to see Starmer posing in military garb. For one thing, I thought Labour types were supposed to be touchy about cultural appropriation. He wouldn’t dare wear a sombrero if he visited a Mexican restaurant, nor don a grass skirt while visiting Maoris in New Zealand. So why does he think he has to dress up in military fatigues just because he is visiting an army base? 

We know who you are: you are a lawyer, not a lance corporal. Stop trying to pretend you know one end of a bazooka from another. By the way, there is no point in wearing camouflage indoors, either. It is there to help make you blend into the grass and bushes, not concrete. 

To be fair to Starmer, he isn’t the first senior politician to entertain fantasies of being a soldier. Liz Truss wore a flak jacket while taking her own drive in a tank. Boris Johnson, too, turned out in fatigues on a visit to our troops in Estonia. Michael Heseltine, unsurprisingly, also wore military gear. 

I say to any politician thinking of dressing up in military gear: no, you are not going to impress us. You just make yourself look like Idi Amin. There are enough countries around the world whose leaders have been put there by military force. There are no votes to be had in seeming to emulate them.        

can you hear it, in the distance?

can you sense it, far away...?

Is it old Rudolph the reindeer? Is it Santa on his sleigh?

oH It's heading up to Easington! It's coming down the Tyne!

Oh, it's bloody Maggie Thatcher And Michael Heseltine

So,

self-indulgent spitting image blog

this is mainly reserved for me editing spitting image, my art of it, my headcanons and the like

main: @a-staphaios

Q: Who are you?

Just some English teen who loves Spitting Image. One of my special interests is UK politics and my favourite politicians are Tony Benn and Michael Foot.

Q: What are your favourite sketches and puppets?

Sketches: Exchequers, News At Benn, Criminal Libel, Alliance Anonymous, Roy Jenkins Remembers

Puppets: Harold Wilson, Michael Foot, Neil Kinnock, David Owen, Michael Heseltine (+ the rest of the Cabinet), Steve Davis

I do not approve any real life actions anyone may have done! I just see them as their puppets here

Q: Isn’t this just playing around with people?

Yes and no. I treat Spitting Image puppets as a distorted version of their real life counterparts. I consider them entirely separate!

Q: What are your political beliefs?

If you can’t tell from my ‘Who are you?’ question, I’m a socialist. I just love making fun of right wingers, left wingers and centrists equally.

yeah i knoooow that commercial art is no replacement for real political education and that the aesthetic of revolution are constantly being coopted by a capitalist system that swallows artists and turns their creations into mass produced goods, But. the billy elliot musical having a little printed leaflet distributed for free to each person watching it explaining who margaret thatcher was who michael heseltine was what the situation of coal miners in the 1980s northern england was and the economic policies that lead to that situation, along with a musical number literally called 'solidarity' that mocks middle class policemens self righteous perspective on strike repression, and a second act opener called 'merry christmas maggie thatcher' about all the striking coal miners putting on a pantomime to mock and laugh at margaret thatcher and enjoy the holidays through mutual support........

I’d like you to know that I thought michael hutchence was an english MP until I saw you posting about him. sorry

nobody on the famous historical important suicides wikipedia page anymore / cares about good guitar based new wave/dance hits, sad! also were you getting him confused with thatcher goon michael heseltine? even more offensive

For some reason I instigated a conversation about whether there was such a thing as a sexy politician, which led to my parents and uncle discussing this while I was largely baffled by what to say.

Turns out my uncle has an eye for Jess Phillips and my mother fancies Michael Heseltine.

Why do I get myself into these situations?

We interrupt this broadcast to bring you breaking news.

Michael Heseltine - whether or not you wish to admit it - is weirdly attractive. 

Please tell us what happened with Heseltine and the parlimentary mace?

oh it's a great story! for those who might not know - the mace represents the king's authority in parliament and without it parliament can't meet or pass laws - and this tradition goes back to the 13th century.

the heseltine incident happened in 1976 when the labour party were in power but with a laughably small majority (319/635 seats), and a couple of months after their leader/the PM harold wilson resigned. i'll just paste an article from the time here because i think this describes the events better than i ever could:

Against an unprecedented background of fisticuffs, the singing of the Red Flag and a Conservative attempt to run away with the mace, the Government sneaked home to an unprecedented victory of one vote in its battle to overrule an attempt to destroy its nationalisation plans for the shipbuilding industry. Nothing like it has been seen in the Commons chamber for more than 40 years. As soon as the whips announced that a Government majority had been achieved by 304 votes to 303, Labour MPs stood up and began to sing The Red Flag. As they reached the words "We'll keep the red flag flying here," Mr Michael Heseltine, Tory spokesman at the conclusion of the debate, jumped up and seized the mace from its rack beneath the Speaker's Chair. As he waved it aggressively towards the Labour Benches, his Shadow Cabinet colleague Mr James Prior wrested it from his hands and replaced it in its rack the wrong way round. While Mr Prior was changing ends, so to speak, a fracas developed in front of the Tory front bench. Mr Geoffrey Rippon, a former Tory Minister, seemed to be in full physical conflict with Mr Dennis Canavan, Labour MP for Stirlingshire West. Mr Canavan was pulled away by Mr Peter Snape, a Labour Whip. But as the altercation turned into something very like a brawl in the middle of the floor of the Commons, Deputy Speaker, Sir Myer Galpern, rose and declared: "The House is suspended for 20 minutes."

bonus:

Normally such a move would have ended the disturbance. But within a matter of moments, as MPs were moving out of the chamber, yet another outbreak of scuffling took place. Mr Tom Swain, a miners' MP from Derbyshire, was seen to be fighting with a Tory member, Mr Michael Spicer, (Worcestershire South).

it's almost comforting reading this because it makes me feel less alarmed at the sorts of scenes you see in parliament today. but that same thought also makes me feel very depressed. swings and roundabouts.