Howling and a few of his loyal supporters plus Knigel ” Big Fibber ” Knapp and Lisa Robins representing the Longdog brewery were invited to the Houses of Parliament on Wednesday 25 June to officially launch Longdog’s Winning Co-ALE-ition in The Strangers Bar.
The party arrived at the Houses of Parliament around midday and were met by Rollo Hope (no relation to Howling) at 12.30 who escorted the group to The Strangers Bar. Straight after Prime Minsters’ Questions (PMQs) they were then joined by their joint hosts
Sir Gerald Howarth (Conservative MP for Aldershot and Rushmoor District) and Maria Miller (Conservative MP for Basingstoke and former Coalition Govt Minister for Culture), plus James Arbuthnot (Conservative MP for Fleet and NE Hampshire) and Simon Hughes (Lib Dems MP for Bermondsey and Old Southwark and currently the Coalition Govt Minister for Justice).
Back in Feb 1983, when the Loony Party first fielded a candidate at an election, it was Screaming Lord David Sutch who took on Simon Hughes in the Bermondsey by-election.
Simon Hughes won this by-election and was elected as an MP for the first time in 1983 and has been the Bermondsey MP ever since. We have invited Simon several times to Co-ALE-ition launch events to celebrate 30 years of the OMRLP and his own 30 year term as the Bermondsey MP and we were especially delighted he accepted our invitation to join us in The Strangers Bar for this very special launch of Winning Co-ALE-ition which was first luanched in Sept 2013 to celebrate 30 years since the OMRLP first stood at an election.
All four MPs were drinking Winning Co-Ale-ition and the ale was on fine form and served in excellent condition by Will the barman. Will also confirmed that Winning Co-ALE-ition had been on sale since Monday and was very popular and he expected all 5 casks to be sold in less than a week.
Winning Co-ALE-ition is the only ale brewed for a political party to appear in a bar in the Houses of Parliament and yet another first for the OMRLP.
It was amazing for Howling to see himself portrayed on the Winning Co-ALE-ition pumpclip in The Strangers Bar with his hand held up high by David Cameron (photo was taken at the Witney General Election count in May 2010) knowing that this would be visible to lots of MPs from all parties and would really put the Loony Party on the map.
Howling’s party, together with their MP guests, then moved onto the outside terrace of The Strangers Bar for the afternoon where they were able to soak up the sun drinking Co-ALE-ition looking out over a magnificent panorama featuring the River Thames and Westminster Bridge. They were a truly privileged group of people and as they left the Houses of Parliament they noticed that the direction sign for the House of Lords had been changed to the “House of Lauds”
HOPEfully signalling that Howling will soon take his well deserved place in the second chamber!