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There is only one solution to the woke financial crisis: give Nigel Farage his own bank

By Abigail Pennson, our reasonable, plain-speaking middle-class columnist who believes Sadiq Khan has it in for her personally

BANKING is woke. Business is woke. Your smartphone is woke and broadcasting everything you say to woke censors. Only Nigel can save us now.

I tried to deny it for years. My bank, the solid NatWest, in the hands of radical Marxists set on destroying Western values to revive the zombie corpse of communism? They didn’t seem like that when I was paying a cheque in, I joked.

Wilfully blind, I deluded myself that British Gas was an energy provider, not a climate change zealot. That the Nationwide Building Society was a lender, not a brutal enforcer of rainbow confirmity. That Tesco was a retailer, not a policeman.

No longer. Nigel Farage, the perpetual outsider, the serial tearer-of-scales-from-eyes, the only honest man left in Britain, has done it again. By being denied his account at Coutts he has exposed the whole woke business sector for decadent, drug-addled activists.

We now know why they refused to back the common-sense, kitchen-table economics of Liz Truss. Why they were determined to see Boris defenestrated even when Britons took to the streets in their tens of millions to stop them, not that the media reported it.

The rot goes right to the top. Every bank, every blue-chip business, every institution in Britain has been taken over by these pod people. If they have infected even the Queen’s bank, how can it be seriously doubted?

The solution? Staring us right in the face. Don’t give Farage an account. Give him the bank.

Full ownership of NatWest. Full control of its funds, handed to the Saviour of Brexit. Full licence to operate however he likes exempt from all our petty, risk-averse regulations.

Within a year? Wokeness will be on the run. Within two? The Tories re-elected, but in no doubt about where the true power lies. Within a decade? Britain rules an Empire again.

Give it to Nigel. Give our whole damn country to Nigel. After the unspeakable insult of closing his account he deserves it.

Fifteen courses and I'm still hungry: The gammon food critic samples the tasting menu

Restaurant reviews by Justin Tanner, our retired food critic who thinks fresh-faced 16-year-old Sam Fox cheered the nation up

FINE dining? Fucking rip-off. Poxy little plates that would leave a bulimic peckish and pretentious menus in French.

But my mate had booked the tasting menu for an anniversary dinner just days before his bird left him, and I can’t abide food waste so I persuaded him we’d go together. He’s paying. I’m doing him the favour, after all.

The place has got one Michelin star, which to my eyes seems like a tyre company thinks it’s shit but apparently means it’s good. It boasts about offering a ‘unique, enlightening dining experience’ like it’s some kind of culinary road to Damascus.

There’s more cutlery at the table than I’ve got in the house and the menu’s entirely in French. I’ve a problem with French anyway, because surely they should be speaking English post-war, from simple gratitude? And it’s billed as a ‘Menu Degustation’. Now that’s taking the piss.

I order the wine, since my mate’s still being a miserable prick about getting dumped and needs to get some booze down him. Says it’s 105. Presume that means £10.50. At that price we’ll have two.

We begin with an amuse bouche. I’m not laughing. Seared scallops this, cauliflower puree that, elderflower the fucking other. I feel like I’m eating the leftovers of six other meals.

The main courses aren’t much better. Tiny pan-fried trout fillets when a jumbo battered cod is what I really want. Poxy little quail breasts. I’ve seen bigger tits on Olympic gymnasts. And how do you expect to serve a foie gras cappuchino and not be laughed at?

‘Pommes frites?’ I enquire hopefully. ‘D’oignon en beignet?’ ‘Pain a l’ail?’ All in vain. They keep bringing sorbets to cleanse our palates. I nip out for a B&H for much the same reason.

And I know it’s a difficult time, wondering if he’ll ever dip dick again, but my mate’s no company. ‘She said she can’t see an us anymore.’ Aye, they always say that. What she means is she’s met someone better, which you’ll find out in about three months.

Dessert is some sort of bland, creamy panna cotta type bollocks. Or mille feuille. Honestly it was so small it was impossible to tell. We go our separate ways and my route very deliberately goes past the chippy.

A unique dining experience? Definitely, because I’m not going fucking back. At least it was free.

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