The news that Julian Fellowes, Oscar-winning scriptwriter of "Gosford Park", had helped write the speech Iain Duncan Smith gave at the Conservative Party's spring conference will not much surprise those who were there. The occasion lacked a little of the glamour of the Oscar ceremony (favourite dress designer: Marks & Spencer) but there was something familiar about the tone. As Hollywood wept its way through the thought of all the black people it had discriminated against over the years, Mr Duncan Smith spoke of a housing estate where he saw a discarded teddy bear. "A perfectly ordinary sight. Except that it lay next to the paraphernalia of a crack cocaine addict. What hope does that child have?" The movie business is used to this kind of thing, and dabs its eyes obediently. The Tory audience was too stunned to cry. No wonder Lady Thatcher, on the advice of her doctors, had just announced that she would not speak in public again. Unwell? Apoplectic more like.
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