"the Ostrich Pope': Human Rights Qc Considers How Benedict Will Be Remembered

By Ephraim Hardcastle
Daily Mail
February 12, 2013

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2277730/The-ostrich-Pope-Human-rights-QC-considers-Benedict-remembered.html?ito=feeds-newsxml#axzz2KlLmnPCF

Human rights QC Geoffrey Robertson thinks Pope Benedict XVI will spend the rest of his days in litigation over worldwide child abuse cases brought against the Roman Catholic church. He says: ‘I think he’ll go down in history as the ostrich Pope, the one who stuck his head in the sand while the storm was brewing.’ Benedict is portrayed in a poor light in Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, an award-winning US documentary released on Friday. Rather than being ignorant of clerical abuse scandals – as he has claimed – they say he was in charge of Vatican information-gathering on the subject. Deep waters.

Robertson thinks Benedict will spend the rest of his days in litigation over worldwide child abuse cases brought against the Roman Catholic church

Gyles Brandreth met the papal tailor while researching his novel, Oscar Wilde and the Vatican Murders. ‘He has an all-purpose white soutane (cassock) ready which can be altered to fat or thin depending on the new Pontiff’s girth.’ Just like the Masters golf tournament winner’s green jacket.

Cross-dressing comedian Eddie Izzard, 51, researched his heritage for Meet the Izzards, a two-part BBC1 documentary. He found he’s descended on his father’s side from a pygmy tribe in Cameroon and on his mother’s from Namibian bush folk and Vikings. No surprises there.

The annual Parliamentary pancake race between MPs, peers and journalists, in aid of the Rehab charity, ended in acrimony yesterday. Labour MP Ian Murray and Lib Dem peeress Baroness Kramer yanked off the apron of galloping People political editor Nigel Nelson, putting him off his stride. Sky’s shapely Sophy Ridge says the victorious MPs’ team threw pancakes in her face. ‘More like Shove Tuesday than Shrove Tuesday,’ comments a participant.

Why no fuss from ministers about the serving of halal meat to non-Muslim pupils at school lunches? Many think the halal method of animal slaughter is cruel and would like to see it banned. Taking on the horse-eating French and bucolic Romanians is easier, I imagine.

Labour's London Assembly member Andrew Dismore told Mayor Boris Johnson he was guilty of ‘dithering indecision like some sort of latter day Lord Emsworth?’ – a reference to P G Wodehouse’s fictional, pig-breeding peer. Boris’s spirited reply: ‘Sorry, am I hearing this from someone who has completely abdicated his responsibilities and is so invertebrate, so protoplasmic, so anaemic in his own personal decision-making that he cannot actually come up with a Fire Brigade budget in spite of sitting on that committee and having that responsibility to the people of London?’ A taste of some future Prime Minister’s Questions?

Actor Timothy West, 78, says he is joining Coronation Street 52 years after his wife, Prunella Scales, appeared in it. ‘She asked me to give her love to anyone who’s still in it. I pointed out that as she started in episode 4 that didn’t leave too many. Just William Roache, who plays Ken Barlow!’ As it happens, Ken’s so absorbed with the Pure Love Movement he has parted from his girlfriend, Emma Jesson.