Lord Bonkers often tells me the story of how he was at an Aldeburgh Festival concert when the hall was inundated by the sea. He snatched up a double bass as it floated past and paddled himself to safety, accompanied by Benjamin Britten on the piano.

Saturday

To the Royal Opera House, Oakham. The first Lady Bonkers was a great Wagnerian, and when I returned from business at the House would often greet me in the guise of Brünnhilde – “Hojotoho! Hojotoho! Heiaha! Heiaha!” and so forth.

The evening’s entertainment is Benjamin Britten’s ‘Darren Grimes’, which tells the story of a Suffolk fisherman who wins the bad opinion of his fellows and takes up politics as a career instead. There he falls into bad company and is fined £20,000 by the Electoral Commission before putting to sea in his boat and never being seen again.

There is a lesson there that I trust all Young Liberals will take to heart.