What do you buy the friend who has everything? A set of John Major toby jugs, of course
What present do you buy the friend who has everything?
Why, a set of John Major Toby jugs of course. If you move quickly, you will be able to bag yourself a set of three, each one exhibiting a different facial expression – a chirpy grin on the large mug, and an angry glare on the small one. Described as being in good condition, the set is yours for £19.99. They're finished in grey, obviously.
Who buys this sort of stuff is hard to fathom. But if this week's announcement of the impending General Election has got your adrenaline pumping, there's a whole host of oddball political memorabilia out there on the worldwide web. One man's junk is another man's treasure, as the saying goes.
If you've got £150 burning a hole in your pocket, you could spend it on a chess set featuring gargoyle-like representations of the Labour and Tory front-benches from the late 1960s or early 1970s. The castings are so crude it is actually quite difficult to tell who is meant to be who, but you can just about pick out Harold Wilson, Barbara Castle, Ted Heath, and Margaret Thatcher.
The straight-haired female Labour character is presumably Shirley Williams, and the matching knights bear a passing resemblance to Jim Callaghan – or is it Denis Healey? Or maybe Roy Jenkins? The dour, moustachioed Tory looks slightly like former Wolverhampton MP Enoch Powell, but it could just as easily be Windsor Davies.
If that's a little too pricey, for just £50 you can buy a matching set of John Major and Margaret Thatcher candles, with Thatcher in blue, and Major in monochrome.
Weirdly, Major appears to have a bit of a cult following among collectors of this sort of stuff.
A signed, gilt-edged, limited edition copy of his autobiography is on sale for an eye-watering £859.99. The seller says it has never been read – can't possibly think why.
The signatures of Major's entire cabinet of November 1993, on a flyer for the Ealing Acton Winter Ball, is yours for £400.
If Major is not your bag, a Neil Kinnock egg cup – barely more recognisable than the chess pieces – is yours for £30.
A Kinnock jug, which at least bears a passing resemblance to the former Labour leader, is yours for £110.
If that's outside your budget, an American seller will supply you with a photograph of Kinnock on a visit to a copper mine in Zambia for £15 – plus £10 post and packaging. A picture of Kinnock lighting his pipe is £1 less.
The signature of infamous Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe – famously acquitted of hiring a hitman to murder his alleged gay lover – is on sale for £65. But a signed copy of Paddy Ashdown's book Standing up to Hitler is available for a quite modest £24.99.
In the light of recent allegations, it is hard to see anybody paying £11.99 for the signature of Cyril Smith though.
On the other hand, if you can run to £3,000, it is possible to buy a real piece of British political history – a signed letter from Winston Churchill. Well, it beats a Neil Kinnock egg cup.