Bobby Smith

I am totally and utterly fascinated by something: you may have noticed that we had an election here in Britain last week; a general election. Well actually you might not have noticed. I know that there are people here who don't know that there is an election in France today and that is only 22 miles across the English channel. I always thought about that when I would go 22 miles out in the Pacific to Catalina, a little island, where we would eat sea food and go down deep in to the bowels of a boat with a glass bottom where we would see loads and loads of fish and plants and all the Jacques Coustaeu type of scenery.

But back to the election: each candidate, including the Prime Minister, have to get elected in their own constituency. They don't have to live in that constituency, like in America, but a lot of the MPs (members of Parliament) do own or rent property where they are standing and where they can hold regular surgeries – mainly on Saturday mornings.

The Prime Minister, Theresa May, stood in Maidenhead, which seems a very apt name under circumstances, which is a very rich place.

All MPs have to win in order to take their seats in The House of Commons where there are 650 seats. The winning party has to secure half of that, 625, plus 1 to have an overall majority. An overall majority is when all the parties, added together, cannot vote the government out of office if ever it came to a vote of 'No Confidence.'

You will wonder, if you looked, why this post is called Bobby Smith. I have to say that it is a famous name in sport in that he was a great centre forward and played for Tottenham Hotspur (the spurs) amongst other clubs.

But that is not the Bobby Smith in this piece; Theresa May had many people standing against her in Maidenhead, in fact there were 12, which brought the total up to 13 and Bobby Smith, a 35 year old heavy goods driver came last. He was an independent candidate standing for family court reform whatever that is and Give me back Elmo.

There he is at the top of the page – now what had astounded me is that he only received 3 votes. Out of an electorate of about 55,000 he got just 3 votes. Theresa May received 37,718 and had about 64% of the vote.

But what happened to Bobby Smith; how many friends and family did not vote for him? Let's look, he must have voted for himself – hang on he lives in Stevenage so he won't be able to vote in Maidenhead. Didn't he have any friends there?

When I have appeared in Edinburgh at various festivals I have often wondered, when I have asked at the box office, why there was nobody booked for a certain night – well I wonder no more; Bobby Smith, even though he was standing against the highest profile candidate in the land could not attract more than 3 votes.

Jacques Coustaeu type of scenery

Catalina underwater