Squirrels

[webofevil]

Thanks to psychonomy for passing this on—and indeed for transcribing it in the first place:

The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Rooker): When I flicked through a newspaper this morning, I could not figure out why on earth someone had done a diary piece about how many times I have mentioned the word “squirrels” in the past six months. I thought, “Blimey, someone’s calculated this”. It was only seven times; the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, is apparently on 200. With the reshuffle coming, the piece said that I do not have much time to make up in mentioning the word “squirrels”. Well, squirrels are actually very important. Red squirrels are more important than grey squirrels. I now realise why someone has been alerted to the fact that squirrels need a mention.