Catherine Nicoll fishing for Gilaroo in 'The Portal'

News is thin on the ground even Crown Dependency News is quiet perhaps Eddie Power is scouring MercoPress - expect some South Atlantic stories later.

However the Manx Radio portal is alive. Catherine Nicoll is giving ‘Popeye’ aka Alex Allinson MHK a forensic going over. Allinson stunned everyone recently by saying he was cutting back on the double jobbing as a ‘medico’ to spend more time with COMIN. You get the sense he’s hanging around the corridor outside Howards Office hoping that Laurence Skelly will have one debacle to many at DfE or that Geoffrey Boot will have another barbeque. Allinson visibly exudes the desire to be part of the great man’s inner sanctum.

The interview seems anodyne stuff although I’m pleased when Nicoll suggests Allinsons latest efforts are what they are - irrelevant navel gazing. I detest Allinson he’s taken over from Alf Cannan as my MUA hate figure. I have a facsimile of him on an MUA bill that I throw darts at.

I relax with a suitably filled smoked bacon sandwich and a mug of tea to enjoy the midday fun.

Nicoll is impassive and the questions glide out calmly while ‘Popeye’ wriggles like a Gilaroo - come to think of it Allinson resembles a Gilaroo! Momentarily I wonder if Nicoll spends her spare time fishing at Lough Melvin in Fermanagh.

I’m enjoying this but sadly to much because as I bite into my sandwich Allison says (deadpan): ‘We also need to make sure that the process of government is nimble and agile’. I immediately start choking and for a few minutes think that I will be in need of A&E or the local group practice.

Having recovered I make a mental note to suggest to Manx Radio that some political interviews should carry a health warning.

By the time I return to the debate Allinson is wittering on about; ‘The end of a chapter’ where does he get these quotes from perhaps Robertshaw has a book of ‘Handy Interview Tips For New MHKs’ that he’s hawking around Tynwald. Nicoll meanwhile looks as if she’s thinking of her next fishing holiday.

It’s only about a week since Tynwald broke for their hols I anticipate there will be more of this.

Here’s the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLlYbZRWy2iElKpmnjfIMZsfI9wcoj4y9s&ti...

Bernard Moffatt