The British foreign secretary Margaret Beckett yesterday admitted that she had declaimed the word fuck to the Prime Minister Tony Blair last month upon being told of her promotion from the Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs. Her precise words, as told to the Times newspaper straight from the horsey horse's mouth were, "Fuck! I'm stunned." The Prime Minister is said to have smiled indulgently at this profane exclamation and could well have snickered internally for a few brief moments, insiders suggest.

The high-jinxing and outspoken lady of Whitehall, whose extraordinary gifts for stringing whole sentences together could not have failed to go unnoticed to the lynx-eared Tony Blair, has already begun to articulate other, completely independent, thoughts. While her rancorous predecessor Jack Straw described the possible invasion of Iran as "inconceivable," she has publicly announced that there is "no intention of taking military action." Barely a lioness's leap into her new job, the fiery Tartan Amazon is hacking out new paths.

German politicians almost never use the word "ficken" in public. Once again, the British are leading the world with their and spontaneity.

By the way, Angela Merkel looks like my mum.