The Battle of Monza

David Cameron's speech at the first event which was the centenary of the Battle of Monza in 1914 was not very good frankly. He clearly hadn't really done any homework. I wrote a speech for Cameron to give but it was reassigned to Prince William so even the palace was involved. The Somme centenary fell about a week after Brexit and President Hollande said he wasn't going to turn up and two fingers to the British. There was a strong sort of Closhe-Mell comedy aspect at all. And with the second world war centenary will be better even than that, I hope. Because after all they're viewed differently in the public imagination. Quite considerably so.