This is the Technical Difficulties,
we’re playing Citation Needed. Joining me today: he reads books, y'know,
it’s Chris Joel. “Hello!” Everybody’s favourite Gary Brannan,
Gary Brannan. ♫ I-i-if women like that like men like those,
then why don’t women like me? ♫ Singing(!) And the bounciest man on the internet,
Matt Gray. Howdy, YouTube! - Oh!
- Nice. Nice. In front of me I’ve got an article from Wikipedia
and these folks can’t see it. Every fact they get right is
a point and a ding and there's a special prize for particularly
good answers which is... And today we are talking about John Stonehouse. Did he live in a greenhouse? Completely against type. Now's when you ding, Tom(!) No. I can’t give you that. Am I close? No... In any way? No. Was he... a bricklayer? Stone House? No. No he wasn’t. He did go to work in a House, and there’s
a capital H in that. A House of something. Cards. Fun. Ill repute. I mean, you’re pretty close with
House of Cards. Parliament. Yes, have a point. - Oh!
- Yay. Born in Southampton, educated there and at
the London School of Economics. So was he not a politiciser? And then he went into politics, as the
Labour Cooperative Member of Parliament. So he owned some small supermarkets(?) Erm, sort of... Did you hear that? Clunk-clunk-clunk-clunk! “Archivist gear engaged. “Everybody else shut up, I know the answer.” I don’t! But you do still have
Cooperative Labour MPs. In what sense? They don’t sit at the back going,
“F*** no. “It’s bollocks, we’re not doing it.”. Pretty much. He worked very closely to the
Foreign Office. There was the Foreign Office, the Home Office,
the India Office and then another one. Commonwealth. Ooh, no… No, it’s pre-Commonwealth. Empire? Halfway between the two. Com-pire. Places We Stole Office. Yes, it’s the Colonial Office, so yes, I will
give you the point for that, absolutely right. Yes, he became Minister for State for Technology
and then took a role… Was he going around people’s houses trying
to sell cable? You never had that? Not from the Colonies Office, no! He moved on from there, this was... You said technology, I don't for... I know nothing about politics or other countries!
I've got to go somewhere. I’ve just realised that... Would you like some Colonial Cable? I’ve just realised, we’ve not actually
touched on telegraphs yet and we have to do that at least once or twice
a seas… Oh, f*** off! Yes, he became Minister for State for Technology,
but that meant he then transitioned into what? And this was in charge of telecommunications
as well as telegraphy, everything like that. - Post Office.
- Postmaster General. You’re both getting the point. He was the
Postmaster General of the United Kingdom. Hell of a title, that. Yes. He was also the last Postmaster General
of the United Kingdom. Oh God, what did he do? Nothing, they’ve just all been
really specific since. (Yes!) Sorry, Matt! Specific... Oh… Anything that has General on the end
sounds great, anyway. He oversaw the jamming of something. A marmalade factory. There’s this sort-of jam war going on where
they just… He’s holding toast at the other end. That’s Wallace and Gromit, isn’t it, actually? We must stop this terrible conflict... to preserve life. Ohhh! Even the audience was
half-hearted on that one. Wouldn’t want people to end up marmalised. 1970, he oversaw the jamming of something. ’70? 1970. - Is it pirate...
- Pirate radio! Yes. I’ll give you the point there,
specifically what, where’s it coming from? - Luxembourg?
- North Sea? You’re thinking Radio Luxembourg but no,
you’re absolutely right, it’s off in the North Sea. This was one of the Radio Carolines. - Oh!
- Was it? You see I didn’t say that because
I thought it was a leading question and it would be wrong. Yes, but this isn’t QI! You’re allowed
to go for that answer here. Awooga! So he jammed Radio Caroline and part of the
response to that was that Radio Caroline did what? Jammed them right back. No, that actually would be... not illegal,
but it certainly would be, I think, a declaration of war if you do that to a country. And when it comes to boats we’ve probably
got the bigger shooty ones in town. We might have slightly more. Because Caroline was on and off for a bit.
So was it off for a bit? It was, they tried to overcome the jamming,
obviously, what were they sending back over the airwaves? Swear words. Filthy streams of invective… They could have done, they were offshore. Don’t forget Radio Caroline wasn’t illegal, they just made it so that any British person
associating with it was breaking the law. “Vote for the other ones.” Yes, absolutely right, they went political and they started broadcasting pro-Conservative
propaganda back at them. Sorry! Pirate radio station broadcasting
pro-Conservative messages? Let that sink in for a minute. “Vote Tory!” Yeah, you wouldn’t get that
these days would you? Blimey. No, there’s no pirate radio stations! - There are.
- Oh, there are. I was going to say, presumably you have deal
with those, Matt. Yes, they interfere over the broadcasts that
we are trying to make at work. And then we report them to OFCOM and then
they find them and say no, you’re being naughty, please
don’t do that. When you said deal with them, that suggested
you somehow went round at night and dealt with them. With a baseball bat. Matt Gray does have a black ski-mask and an
awful lot of black turtlenecks. A van just comes out of the OFCOM offices
with you guys in. John Stonehouse, still in charge of post and
telecommunications in the 1970s, introduced what? It’s not stamps or anything because they’re
already there... Oh, it is. - Is it stamps?
- Second-class...! Is it second-class stamps? Absolutely right, first and second-class stamps.
These all seem… (You f***er!) ...fairly normal. In 1970 he was setting up
various companies, having things on the side. By 1974 most of these were in financial trouble. What did he decide to do? Print himself a whole book of stamps
as legal tender and pay off his debts with
a massive box full of stamps. That would have been a better plan than the
one he actually had. Issue a single ÂŁ150,000 stamp on the quiet
to a collector. Also a better plan than what he did. Jesus Christ! Rob a bank. With stamps. Hang on, did he invent selfie stamps, where you could send in a selfie and you’d
have your own stamp? He didn’t set up his pirate radio station
did he, playing pro-Tory propaganda? He’s in deep financial trouble here, he’s doing creative accounting so he’s
going to be going to jail. Did he disappear? Oh, a little bit more than that. Is he…? Did he fake his death? Yes, he did. He faked his… Is he one of these clothes on the beach guys
and disappears? Spot on. Exactly right, he faked his death,
November 1974, leaving a pile of clothes on a Miami beach. Whose clothes? His clothes. Where was he actually going? Cuba! Australia. That’s a long swim. You’re one better than me, I was going to
say a long walk which would have been quite stupid. Well, swimming it naked,
he’s going to get cold. He is. Maybe he slathered himself
in goose fat beforehand. And, hell, he’s going the wrong way round,
he should have gone from LA. Yeah, the man’s a fool. Goose fat is what you use,
I’m right aren’t I? That’s what you use for cross-channel swimming. Yes, when you’re swimming from Miami to
Australia, that’s what you use. Goose fat, yes. Most people use their arms and legs.
Gary, goose fat. -“It’ll be fine!”
- Just bobs around... “Gary, there’s a breaker.” “It’s fine, the goose fat'll save me!” Ejecting it from behind,
like propulsive goose fat. Hey, a goose gives out a lot of fat, you know. He’s just leaving this greasy trail on the
ocean as he goes. “Gary Brannan’s greasy ocean trail.” Hell of a series. I once did a goose at Christmas
and it put out... A single goose-- now in all fairness I got
it from a budget supermarket so it may not have been the very best of geese,
let’s be honest. Budget supermarkets sell geese? For a tenner! Yes, they just get them from the local pond,
and you know… Ask no questions, tell no lies.
That’s the way I looked at it. But I did, and it pumped half a litre of fat. It didn’t even drip out, it literally just
leaked fat. You know those things when you get oil wells
and there’s a gusher… “Goose fat, we’re rich! Ah, I'm greasy...” “Quick take me to the Channel!
This is my only chance!” “White gold!”, he cried. Did it deep fry itself? Half a litre? It just... you put it on an angle to let it
all drain out and it just kept coming and coming and coming. It was a whole big mincemeat jar that big
was nearly full of goose fat. No man in the world can eat that much
roast potatoes, is what I’ve found. Sorry, can I just point out: mincemeat jar full of goose fat, that’s
quite a northern thing to say… So yes, Stonehouse, meanwhile.
Stonehouse was... I’m just trying to pull this back. It was in my fridge for months! I remember, you sent me a picture of it! You actually sound closer to
tears than laughter, Gary. Because, just after we’d had this massive
Christmas dinner where I’d done the goose. I got all this goose fat, the holy grail of
Yorkshire puddings and roast potatoes... Went on a f***ing diet
and I never touched the stuff. AUDIENCE: Aww. And in this jar was… John Stonehouse… Seamless(!) John Stonehouse was en-route to Australia setting up a new life with
his mistress and secretary. Are they two separate people? Was he just being a real arse and taking his
mistress and his secretary? Well, who was his new identity?
Whose identity had he taken on? Did he nick a dead person's? Yes, he did. Deceased husband of a constituent. So he deposited cash at one bank, picked it
up at another and the teller was suspicious and reported him to local police. The police, when they interviewed him, asked him to drop his trousers. Why? Normal. Was the person he was pretending to be a eunuch? No, just his trousers, just his trousers. Well they’re looking for an identifying mark,
are they not? So tattoo or birthmark. Yes... neither. This is 1974. Lord Lucan! Yes. They suspected that he was Lord Lucan
who had very famously disappeared, there’s a whole separate story there. Someone suspiciously turning up
with an English accent in Australia, depositing large sums of money. Who is obviously on the run... Lord Lucan had a large scar down his leg. So the police were going,
well, drop your trousers, we want to see if you’re Lord Lucan.
He wasn't... Did he debag himself in aid of the… Because if he did, and he dropped his trousers
and there’s no scar, he should surely be let go. Yes, and then they’re not going to be suspicious
of him ever again. Yes, he was still arrested, they just knew
he wasn’t Lord Lucan. Oh. “We know you’re somebody but we don’t
know who. “Standard procedure, drop the trousers.” That was essentially... yeah, that would have
been 1974. “What do we do second?”
“I don’t know, it’s never failed.” “Every arse tells a story.” “All right, we’re going to need
to get your arse print here, “please just sit in this ink for a little
while, and then on this paper...” “Just reverse onto this paper.” “It’s thumbprint. Thumbprint!” He’s arrested, six months later he’s deported
to the UK. He’s remanded in Brixton prison. What has
he not done at any point during this? Pulled his trousers up. Walked really waddly all the way. “They haven’t said I could,” he said. Changed his name back? Bear in mind his job. As Postmaster General, ex… Sorry, what was that? Postmaster General, ex-Postmaster General. Was he still in the same job?
Had he not been sacked? - Yes.
- Oh, s***! He did not resign as an MP. Oh, boy! So did he come back to massive fines for not
having done his job properly? - No, he was an MP.
- You don’t get fined for not doing your job. - Oh!
- Satire. He just kept being an MP and getting his salary. Were they still paying him throughout the
entire time he buggered off? Well, at this point,
he had to have his trousers down because of the sheer size of his balls. He was put on trial on 21 charges of fraud,
theft, forgery, conspiracy to defraud, causing a false police investigation
and wasting police time. He sounds right for an MP. Trial was 68 days long.
He conducted his own defence. That’s brave. Yeah, it didn’t work all that well. Did he just drop his trousers when he could? And say repeatedly, “not Lord Lucan” because
it worked the first time. After his release he worked as a fundraiser, joined what became the Liberal Democrats, wrote some novels, started a small business
that sold hotel safes. I'm speeding through all this… - Hotel safes?
- Hotel safes. Because he’s used to embezzling money… They had a funnel that went directly to his
bank account. “Put money in my safe!” “No, f*** you!” - “You put money in your safe!”
- “Invest in my company…” It hasn’t got a back on it! More than 20 years after his death,
something was revealed about him. He was Lord Lucan? He just had a lot of bio-oil. I thought he was going for the button to say
yes then! No, no, way, way back in his political career, he’d negotiated an
agreement of technological cooperation between Britain and Czechoslovakia, as was. Uh oh. Is he a spy? Oh, he's sp-- in fact-- The minute you say 'information sharing' and
'Czechoslovakia' which is in the former Soviet bloc, he’s not going to just be going and eating
their fine pastries, is he? Yes, it turned out that he’d been an agent for the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic
military intelligence. S***, he’s Postmaster General! Yes. That’s why it takes so long for your post
to arrive! I’m going to give you a point for twigging
that before I made the connection there. It goes via Czechoslovakia! He was Minister in Charge of Post and Technology. And that includes things like the
Post Office Tower and things like that, that are transmitting signals around the world. Yes. This is pretty bad s*** isn’t it, let’s
face it. This is bad news bears. Somehow the embezzling
and taking someone else’s identity is yet not the worst thing about this man. - No.
- Because he’s used to it! That’s true, that. At the point where the government found out
about this, Margaret Thatcher was in power.
What did she decide to do? - Nothing?
- Privatise him. Yes, he will work with more efficiency
as a privately owned scumbag. British politics jokes there. Well, either nothing or something, is what
I’m going for there. Chris, choose one of those options. I’m going with something. You’re wrong. It’s nothing. Oh… It was easier to cover it up and never let
the public know that there had been a Czech spy in government. Because they’d obviously done no Czechs
on him! Oh… Yes. At the end of the show... Congratulations, Matt, you win this one. How? Genuinely, you got a lot of dings in there. You win breakfast food prepared by the star
of Sherlock. It’s Eggs Benedict Cumberbatch. F***ing... Do enjoy that. With that, we say thank you to Chris Joel. It’s over! To Gary Brannan. To Matt Gray. Bye-bye YouTube. I’ve been Tom Scott,
we’ll see you next time.
Think this might be my favorite episode so far, so many puns!
There's at least one Chinese spy in the New Zealand parliament. They asked him if he was a spy, and he said 'no, I just trained spies for the Chinese spy agency, before they let me come to NZ.' Fair enough, really.