How about a weighing-in ceremony for all our House of Commons MPs? (From Bucks Free Press)

How about a weighing-in ceremony for all our House of Commons MPs?

11:13am Friday 15th May 2009

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IT’S sad but true, but I normally get more Christmas cards each year from curry restaurants than I do from friends and colleagues.

I receive more calls at my home from takeaway drivers than I do from anyone else, and now even when I try to order sensibly at restaurants, the chefs get worried and throw in free food because I am such a good customer.

So, I hear you cry, was it any surprise that I stayed away from this year’s annual weighing-in on Saturday for High Wycombe’s dignitaries?

This was the unique ceremony, dating back to medieval times, at which the mayor and councillors are weighed on scales to see if they have put on any pounds at the expense of taxpayers.

If they have gained weight, they are subjected to boos and hisses – it was rotten tomatoes, apparently, in the old days. Officials simply shout out “and some more” if they are porkier than last year.

If, however, they have lost weight, he calls out “and no more”, and the slimline dignitary is cheered and clapped.

By all accounts, I missed a splendid occasion on Saturday in Frogmoor where just six dignitaries were shown to have put on weight from last year.

One man who I know will be mightily relieved at the results is outgoing High Wycombe mayor Paul Lambourne who told us beforehand he was likely to have added some bulk during his year in office.

“There have been 255 engagements through the Mayor’s Parlour this year.

“It’s not what we eat, it’s the odd hours we eat at,” he said.

“I have got home some nights at 10pm and phoned for a curry to be delivered before going to bed.

“I think I have put on a bit of weight.”

But Paul’s fears proved unfounded when it was declared “and no more” in his case.

This either proves he is far too modest, or that lashings of late-night curry are indeed good for your health.

If the latter were to be the case, then I would be the fittest man in Wycombe.

But the public will never know because I stayed away from the weigh-in on the grounds I was watching my son play football (it’s not the soccer I like, but the barbecue burgers at these events).

In the past, devious dignitaries have tried to get the editor to take the scales with them.

Police and the council chief exec have to be tormented in this way in public, so why not me?

But I don’t have to be officially weighed, because I don’t live off the fat of the land – all of my beer gut is bought and paid for by yours truly.

However, the weighing-in ceremony is genuinely a splendid tradition that shows the anti-sleaze busters were hard at work hundreds of years ago.

This has all left me thinking that perhaps a similar ceremony could be arranged for all 600 plus MPs at the House of Commons.

Parliament could take a leaf out of High Wycombe’s book by first weighing politicians’ body mass in public – and then they could do the same for their expenses claims.

Trouble is, there wouldn’t be scales in the land big enough for that. And the reverberations from the boos and the hisses could well cause the Thames to break through the flood barriers.

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