Silverbacks And The Greek Advisor

05/19/2006

Rainwater sloshes around the old motor as I trundle down the brae into Oban for some supplies. Traffic seems slower than usual and I find George Street is forced to a snail’s pace by a line of huge campervans illegally parked up on the “no waiting” side without either of our nippy traffic wardens in sight. (One of these blighters once threatened to book me for “Obstruction” when I put a wheel on the pavement outside the Hydro office, whilst hurrying to pay a bill before the bailiffs called, no donation from Glen Trollaigh to the Policeman’s Ball that year, the buggers!). I pull up outside the Vets to offload assorted mutts for jabs, clipping and infusions, and wander back along George Street, to window shop and check the lunch menu at Coast (not promising). Imagine my surprise when I twig that all the campervans, which I assumed formed some celebrity convention, all sported disabled parking permits, must have been twenty of them. Over a strong black at the Eeusk I am told that these blow ins are Silverbacks, whose arrival has long been dreaded on the west coast. Legal difficulties and soaring prices on Costa Rip Off, plus the sundries intricacies of using free health care, benefits, pensions and one assumes avoidance of UK council tax, has forced large numbers of over sixties from Middle England onto the road during the summer months. For the last few years they have roamed northern France and the English south coast, however, increasing numbers have forced a tidal surge into Scotland. They spend no money, having loaded their freezers in a Birmingham Aldi, but do use tanker loads of fuel and water, distributing the contents of their chemical kazzi’s and waste bins as they travel from beauty spot to beauty spot. One hears that they also tend to congregate for wild noisy parties, despite the restrictions of walking sticks and zimmer frames, let us hope the Scottish midge comes to our rescue once again.

Our research complete, Lachie and I have planted up one hundred acres of Tobacco to get our noses into the trough of £900 million worth of EU tobacco farming subsidies. The additional benefit is that if we sell the plants on at the farm gate to satisfy the cravings of Argyll smokers there will be no tax due to Chancellor Brown! We have also applied for a Greek farming advisor to help us with development of the crop. It must be my age, but it has taken me a couple of weeks to get my head around the EU rule. Which will pay me handsomely for planting a crop that does not grow here; send an advisor from a country that is currently under investigation for fraudulently receiving subsidy for the very same crop that it has not even planted. All to be sold, tax free, in a country that has vigorously imposed a smoking ban for reasons of public health. I am not a supporter of the common market, but when in Rome, my dears! Yours aye, Archie, The Baron Trollaigh.