Draper and his misdemeanours

Michael Crick has a marvellous post on his blog:

If Gordon Brown, or anyone else, needed to know about Derek Draper's sense of judgement before inviting him to Chequers, perhaps they should have read an article he wrote for the Sunday Mirror back in 1999.

Draper described in great detail 10 years ago how he had been sacked a few weeks earlier as a contributor for the radio station Talk Sport, after broadcasting live from a hot tub in an Amsterdam brothel, with a prostitute.

One unfortunate thing just led to another, Draper tried to explain to Sunday Mirror readers.

First, he'd had to stay overnight in Holland en route to Morocco.

Then, he asked a taxi driver to suggest a club he might visit, and ended up being driven to a high-class brothel, where he was befriended by a beautiful blonde called Claudia.

Draper took up the story:

"Eventually, after downing a bottle of champagne, she [Claudia] said: "Let's go upstairs."

I will be honest. I was tempted. Any bloke would have been - but I also knew I just couldn't do it. "I'm sorry, Claudia," I whispered. "You really are lovely but it just feels wrong."

"Then let's just talk and have a Jacuzzi," she replied. I hesitated, then emptied my glass and followed her upstairs. We drank, talked and laughed and then I remembered Talk Radio. I told her about the James Whale show and she urged me to call.

"I couldn't," I said. "I haven't even brought my mobile."

"I have one," she cried, and produced a Nokia from her handbag. We called the station, and the rest is CV history.

And, with phrases that ring awfully true today, Draper concluded his Mirror account:

"I thought in my naivety that this would all make excellent radio and great PR for the station. Little did I know that the next day I'd be fired."

Surely Gordon Brown and his friends should have questioned the judgement of a man who does all this? And indeed, the judgement of a man who goes on to write about it in a national newspaper.

What a man!