‘Meating’ of minds

Date: 04/04/1996

Oh what fun we all had with beef and the English language at the Turin summit. Suddenly we found ourselves treading through a minefield of unavoidable puns.

“How amusing,” observed one Italian journalist, “that the British minister dealing with beef is called Hogg.”

“How amusing,” countered an English hack, “that your prime minister should be called Lamb-erto!”

Another reporter politely asked for the name of the British prime minister's press secretary, who had just delivered a statement about how the summit talks were going. On being told his name was Jonathan Haslam, the reporter replied: “Has Lamb? A very sensible precaution under the circumstances.”