New Defence Secretary Penny Mordaunt has taken office, but has immediately encountered a hairy problem. The tarantula belonging to her predecessor, Gavin Williamson, is still on his old desk.
An aide, bringing Mordaunt some big red Brexit boxes, found her gazing at the creature dreamily. “What the hell am I supposed to do with this,” she mused. “I think I’ll call him Peter Parker.”
Williamson reportedly tried to reclaim the arachnid, but was denied entry. “Who are you, anyway?” screamed the security man. “You’re nobody, that’s who you are. Now bugger off!”
Parker has already been promoted to thief-catching duties, since he spins a web, any size, and catches thieves just like flies.
With eight legs, he can also answer the phone and write memos at the same time. Parker’s only stipulation is that his true identity remains a secret.
Parker’s old boss, Williamson, has been fingered for negotiating phone contracts while taking a leak. The web of intrigue over 5G security has unravelled a little. Chinese company Huawei insists they are not on the take. It’s a Chinese take Huawei.
Williamson kept the tarantula to reinforce his hard-man image. He is so hard, that he can beat up an egg without getting seriously injured. Stories abound of visitors being intimidated by the spider. “Why the f@&# has that twat got a tarantula on his desk?” was a frequent comment heard at the Defence Department.
From fireplaces to getting fired, Williamson’s career looks like going down in flames.
Meanwhile, Mordaunt has been more or less daunted by the scale of the job left to her. It is not the arms sales, or the fact that her Army is on permanent standby to solve every imaginable problem. It is not even being less famous than a spider. It is striving for relevance when Brexit overshadows everything.
In breaking news, Peter Parker is the latest individual to put himself forward as a potential Tory party leader.