UK Tories take on cats and almond milk, the two biggest scourges facing the world

Welcome to Declassified, a weekly humor column.

Sometimes you just have to sit back and marvel at the sheer villainy.

Certain politicians seem to have happily embraced being portrayed as bad guys. Take Christopher Chope, a British Tory of the old, old school who we might charitably describe as problematic. Chope has in the past blocked a bill that would make “upskirting”— the appalling practice of secretly taking a photo up a woman’s skirt — a criminal offense; once described House of Commons dining room staff as “servants”; and attempted to block legislation to ban wild animals in circuses.

What a charmer! Thank goodness Chope hasn’t been knighted. Oh wait, he has been knighted.

Well, now Chope is trying to overturn a government-backed plan to make abducting cats a criminal offense. I know what you’re thinking: “It’s about time someone stood up for the oft-neglected cat abductors of the world!” Perhaps he should team up with Mary Bale, who sparked public outrage in 2010 when CCTV showed her dumping a cat into a wheelie bin.

In Chope’s defense (not a sentence that gets written a whole lot), he says the legislation should only come in when another new law requiring cats to be microchipped has come into effect.

Incidentally, the BBC reporter who was given the Chope/cats story is named Helen Catt. The same corporation in 2021 sent Phil McCann to report on fuel shortages. I once worked with Ian Onions and Hugo Berger, who were gloriously teamed up for a story (alas not a story about McDonald’s).

Speaking of hamburgers, I once saw Chope’s party colleague Jacob Rees-Mogg sitting outside Burger King in Bristol Airport. Sadly, he was not eating a Whopper (presumably, his roasted swan filled with caviar was still being cooked).

Rees-Mogg, the haunted pencil himself, has also been upping the villainy of late, albeit in a way that’s less sinister, and odder, than Chope. Rees-Mogg this month slammed liberals who “drink skimmed milk to go with their faux leather sandals.” To be fair, if liberals are pouring milk on footwear, leather or otherwise, as if it were cereal, then it’s no wonder the far right is on the rise!

Rees-Mogg was speaking after using a slot on right-wing channel GB News to rate a host of “ghastly” milk alternatives. “Full fat, creamy milk will nourish your inner Tory,” Rees-Mogg wrote on social media as he shared the TV segment in which he had ranted about almonds. I know what you’re thinking: “It’s about time someone had a go at bloody almonds.”

Thank goodness Rees-Mogg hasn’t been knighted. Oh wait, he has been knighted.

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Thanks for all the entries. Here’s the best from our postbag — there’s no prize except for the gift of laughter, which I think we can all agree is far more valuable than cash or booze.

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Paul Dallison is POLITICO‘s deputy EU editor.