No change there, then?

These days the comedian Frankie Howerd has – as is sometimes the lot of showbiz people with a particular persona or style – somewhat fallen out of fashion and I doubt that anyone under the age of forty has ever heard of him.

There was even a period in the late 1950s and early 1960s – in his own forties – when Frankie managed to gain the unwelcome distinction of going out of fashion in his own time.

However, after a ‘down’ period including a nervous breakdown, he fought his way back, creditably assisted in the early stages by Peter Cook who gave him a residency at his famous Establishment club in Soho.

From that edgy, satirical-based rebirth he soon found himself swimming back upriver salmon-style into the comfortable mainstream of formulaic British sit-coms and chat shows whilst also touring with a series of one-man shows.

I thought of Frankie overnight – well, specifically one of his famous catch-phrase asides to his live audiences laughing at one of his put-down jokes: “No don’t – it’s wicked to mock the afflicted …” – when I spotted this piece by John Crace on the fortunes of Change UK, the new independent party consisting of former Labour and Tory MPs who jumped ship from their previous Parties over Brexit, as the EU’s MEP election campaign limps to its conclusion – see here,  on the website of – THE GUARDIAN