That will do nicely, Sir

Is it only me…but, to quote Woody Guthrie, I thought this land was my land.

I have just returned from a wee spot of R&R on an island on the edge of the Eurozone, close to the birthplace of western civilisation. And no I don’t mean Rothesay, though that comes a close second obviously.

On arrival at the airport, along with the swarms of peely wally tourists with whom I had to share my plane, we were met by the sight of one, and I repeat one, olive skinned languid passport official. I feared that my journey across the border and into the troubled Eurozone was going to take hours. And you don’t want that after a sweaty flight spent in close proximity to the heaving masses. I wondered if this Johnny-foreigner Apparatchik might be open to a bribe for a speedy passage through.

But there was no need.

A quick flash of our Passport Burgundy travel documents and we were through. I am sure he just saw the colour and not the photo or our biographical details at the speed with which we passed into the Eurozone and from that single piece of colour coded information alone he deduced we were ok.

Compare and contrast that with our return to the land of our birth.

Here the Praetorian Guard that is the UK Border Agency, dressed para-military style sans balaclavas, treated us all if we were Abu Hamza on a day out from Jordan. Each one of us was eyed up and own, our passports scanned with great diligence and only then with an effort that signalled immense reluctance would the Border Guard Apparatchik signal that it was ok to enter the Land of our Fathers. A process that took the bat of an eyelid in a strange and foreign country took what seemed like an age at the border of our Mother Country. We can learn a lot from Johnny Foreigner, you know.

Now maybe it’s only me but this land is my land and these Guards work for me, for us. Why do we let them get away with this?

I can think of two reasons.

One the uniform gives them power. These people never behaved like that when they all looked and dressed like geography teachers with mismatching flannels and sports jacket combinations. And when you give people power they throw it about, usually in the name of Health and Safety or public security. As if.

And my second reason is down to the Daily Mail and the Daily Express who consistently think that anyone who leaves this country to visit anywhere foreign is consorting with the enemy, has been exposed to dangerous and seditious thoughts, and has become a jihadist. And in this scenario we are letting in hundreds, if not thousands, of people every day who should not be here.

And given that our political masters are so afraid of what the Daily Mail is going to say, they instruct the Apparatchiks to go to extreme lengths to ensure they don’t get a story. The Daily Mail is the real Head of Government in this land.

It is just as well that there is no Daily Mail where I was or my Johnny Foreigner Apparatchik might have to brush up his act and lower his customer service standards to those of our Border Para-Militaries. And that would not be what I call progress.

I really don't see why our Border Police can't just say 'UK Passport-that will do nicely, sir' and wave me through. Unless I have a hook and an eye patch obviously.

Have a great week.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.