Mine Wouldn't Dare

Every morning when we lived in Vienna, I would take my younger daughter to school on the bus. And for many months, when we got off the bus we would be confronted by a huge campaign billboard on behalf of the Freedom Party, which at the time was run by Mr Jörg Haider (who has since come to a sticky end.)

The poster on the billboard featured an enormous picture of Mr Haider, surrounded by adoring peasant types. Their ruddy, open faces were all turned toward him, but he looked beyond them, staring out instead at passers-by, displaying his dazzling white teeth in an alarming grin.

The slogan beneath the picture of Mr Haider read, simply, 'He says what you only think.'

If Mr Haider was the brave articulator of the peasants' most secret thoughts, then I suspect Lesley Beckhouse's daring husband in Queanbeyan performs a similar function for my husband - and perhaps for many other husbands around the world: