Foreign News: Red Flag

When Winston Churchill walked into the new House of Commons in his new role as Leader of His Majesty’s loyal Opposition, Conservatives rose in a body and cheered. Then they sang For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow. This was too much for veteran Laborite backbencher George Griffith. He burst into the Red Flag. Soon all the Government members joined in. Through the ancient chamber rang the words of the left-wing inspirational hymn (tune: O, Tannenbaum):

The people’s flag is deepest red, It’s shrouded oft our martyred dead, And ere their limbs grew stiff and cold, Their heart’s blood dyed its very fold.

Then raise the scarlet standard high, Within its shade we’ll live and die, Though cowards flinch and traitors

sneer,

We’ll keep the Red Flag flying here.

Said newly re-elected Speaker of the House, Colonel Clifton Brown (Conservative) : “I wondered whether I was going to be … director of a musical show.”