A recent query (in connection with this) about how we got Parliament’s approval for National Mistletoe Day in 2005, and a subsequent search for the relevant references, got me looking at mistletoe in parliament in general. Does it get mentioned often? And in what sort of context?
The answer to ‘how often’ is ‘not very’. But the answer to type of context is ‘very variable’ as a search through Hansard, Parliament’s formal record (and allied sources) show. Sometimes it is trivial – for example mistletoe was mentioned in the House a few times during the pandemic, mostly in jokey remarks about the whether kissing was even permissible with social distancing, especially with masks, and referencing the cancellation of the Tenbury Wells mistletoe auctions in 2021.
There are occasional references to the police’s regular ‘Operation Mistletoe’, a seasonal concept rolled out most Christmases and aiming to reduce activities associated with over-indulgence at this time of year. But that’s not very interesting, or really mistletoe-related. Or is it? There are also mentions of mistletoe as a socially freeing concept (e.g. during discussion of the Freedom Bill in 2011) and in association with alcohol taxation. Both could be relevant to Operation Mistletoe!
The alcohol taxation point is, to get serious for a moment, a key issue. The point being that small-scale cider producers can find their businesses unviable if they have to pay the same levy as bigger brewers. Where does mistletoe come into this? Well, as Herefordshire MP Bill Wiggin pointed out, during a debate on this in in 2010, small scale cider makers are the people who ensure traditional orchards are still viable. And in doing that they increase biodiversity (traditional orchards are a key habitat in the UK biodiversity plan) and that biodiversity includes, er, mistletoe. And, as a by the way, keeping alcohol duty low for small scale cider producers ensures that the annual mistletoe crop (which is from orchards) survives and is managed.
Still going back in time, a 2007 debate on the disagreements about access to Stonehenge mentions mistletoe as a means to bring all sides together, referencing the druidic link. Though perhaps the Roman tradition of mistletoe as a plant for parley might have been a better reference. In 2005 of course there’s the National Mistletoe Day episode. Though that isn’t actually referenced in Hansard as it wasn’t a debate as such, it was an Early Day Motion so has to be looked up a different way. The motion was proposed by Bill Wiggin MP (a champion of mistletoe!) and was signed by 17 other MPs, with no objections.Prior to 2005 there are trivial mistletoe references back through the early noughties and the nineties including a 2002 reference – uncomplimentary – to Cliff Richards’ hit song Mistletoe and Wine. I’ll say more about that – the song not the mention – in another blog soon.
Further back there is an interesting exchange in 1986, referencing the recent Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station disaster. MP Mark Hughes asks then Environment Minister William Waldegrave ‘what steps his Department is taking to monitor levels of radioactive caesium in imported mistletoe over Christmas’. Waldegrave replies, reassuringly, that (surprisingly!) he has ‘taken expert advice about this matter. My advisors conclude that even a prolonged period of standing under such mistletoe would not be harmful’ It is unclear whether Waldegrave was being serious, especially as he added ‘It would not, however, be wise to eat imported—or home grown—mistletoe.’
A year earlier, appropriately enough on April Fools Day, mistletoe was mentioned as a means of time-wasting to delay bills, during a discussion of the Transport Bill. David Maclean MP recalled how Allan Rogers, a Welsh MP, had previously, talked ‘for ages and ages about how one should gather mistletoe in Wales‘. Maclean goes on to say that ‘I am just a country lad, and I learned a lot about how to gather mistletoe in Wales.’ Nicholas Ridley, then the Transport Minister, replies ‘It is clear from the facts and from the adventures of the hon. Member for Rhondda (Mr. Rogers) into the season when mistletoe buds should he planted that the Committee has had enough of the time wasting and long-winded nonsense to which it has had to listen for 94 hours. It is time to get on with the Bill’
To be fair I don’t think Allan Rogers spent 94 hours talking about mistletoe (not even I can do that), there must have been other diversions too, but this is a fascinating example of mistletoe being used to delay business and potentially be a filibuster (to use a US word) tactic. There was a reference, in 2002, harking back to what might be the same event, but could be another as it was apparently about the Gas Bill in 1986, not the Transport Bill in 1985. Whether the same event or different, it was the Member for Rhondda again: The context in 2002 was a debate on the ‘Modernisation of the House of Commons’. During this Peter Pike MP, stressing the need for modernisation recalled ‘I remember that when we considered the Gas Act 1986, the then Member for Rhondda spoke for two and a half hours about Wales having a national mistletoe planting day. At the end of that time, he had convinced me of the importance of the issue. However, debating in that way is nonsense, and that is what modernisation is trying to prevent. That is why we want time limits on speeches and better scrutiny.’
A Mistletoe Planting Day! Suggested, albeit jokingly, in 1986. I’ve done a few of those since, though not because the MP for Rhondda suggested it.
Over in the Lords, in December 1982, they were debating ‘Nuclear Forces: Geneva Negotiations’ and Lord Bishopston (Edward Bishop) made a case that the peace of Christmas should be extended to the whole year, saying, with lots of alliteration, ‘At Christmas time the world is a better place. I think that it is better because it is less concerned with missiles and more concerned with mistletoe. Fewer are sensitive about stockpiling and more are toying with ideas for stocking fillers. After Christmas, after the Christmas meals, more people will be reaching for detergents than for deterrents. I suspect that even the Prime Minister will be less strident about Trident on Christmas Day—and long may that be the case! We want to make sure that peace is not only on the cards at Christmas but throughout the whole year.’
Linking mistletoe to missiles is a new concept for me.
Further back again, there’s a reference to mistletoe as a free giveaway in 1962, during a Lords debate on the Molony Report on Consumer Protection. In which Lord Sainsbury (Alan Sainsbury) complains that ‘Hardly a day passes without the announcement of some new gift scheme. Recently, for the lover of what I believe is called in certain circles “pop” music, there was a free jazz record with every pound-packet of a certain well-known brand of margarine. For those who like artificial flowers, there have recently been plastic roses with a packet of detergent, plastic carnations with a rival brand, artificial orchids with a famous brand of soap, and only last week I heard that, with the approach of the festive season, there was artificial mistletoe with a liquid detergent. Would it not be better if the manufacturer, instead of playing on the customer’s psychological weakness, reduced his price? It is axiomatic that a free offer is never free—somebody pays and that somebody, in my opinion, is ultimately the consumer.’
Not actually mistletoe, of course, as the gift is fake (plastic?) mistletoe, a surprisingly early reference to the concept, which I would blame, largely, for any decline in sales of the real thing (see multiple previous rants on this).
There’s more. Going back to the immediate post-war period there were, in December 1945, during discussions on trade and commerce, two questions asking about the same thing. Sir John Foster MP asked the President of the Board of Trade ‘for what reason an import licence for mistletoe for sale in this country during the forthcoming Christmas season has been given to one firm and refused to all others; and whether, in view of the fact that the grant of such a monopoly must tend to encourage undesirable practices, he will undertake that henceforward all such applications will be dealt with in consultation with the appropriate trade organisation, thus ensuring a fair deal for all traders involved.’ This was followed by Lieut-Commander Joseph Gurney Braithwaite MP asking the President of the Board of Trade ‘whether he is aware of the dissatisfaction of the fruit and flower trade about the decision of his Department to grant a licence to one firm only and to no others to import mistletoe during the present season from France; that this decision is unfair to the pre-war importers of French mistletoe and will result in unsatisfactory and uneven distribution of the small importation permitted; and what steps he proposes to arrange for a more equitable form of importation and distribution in similar cases in future.’
Sir Stafford Cripps, the then President of the Board of Trade, replied that ‘in order that the mistletoe should arrive in time for our first postwar Christmas, licences were issued to the first two applicants, and these absorbed all the very small amount of foreign exchange available for this purpose’.
Which isn’t, really, a particularly helpful answer. But it does show how much has changed in cross-channel trade since (even with Brexit).
Sir Stafford made up for that poor reply, somewhat, in answering a follow-up question from Colonel Colin Thornton-Kemsley MP who, referencing Sir John Foster’s mention of ‘undesirable practices’ asked ‘will the Minister make it clear that the words “undesirable practice,” refer to the granting of monopoly, and not to the possible use to which mistletoe might be put?’ Cripps replied ‘Certainly, Sir.’
Going back to the pre-war period it is clear that import restrictions and tariffs were, in that period, a constant issue. In 1931 there was a debate on emergency customs provisions for agricultural products. Thomas Williams MP asked the minister several questions, ranging from tomatoes to mistletoe. This is from part of his speech: ‘I ask the right hon. Gentleman, does he intend to put an impost on tomatoes before September because they are too cheap, or to put an impost on them subsequent to September because they are too dear? We shall be interested to hear his reply. I observed, as the result of an interjection by one hon. Member earlier in the day, that the Minister said that not only flowers and bulbs but all foliage would come under Part III of the Schedule. Does that include mistletoe? If so, has the right hon. Gentleman consulted the trade? Has he consulted his own colleagues, if it is his intention to deny them the sport usually obtained about Christmas time? We are entitled to know something about that.’
They are ‘entitled to know’ about whether the ‘sport’ obtained from mistletoe will be restricted! But, unless I missed it, the question is never actually answered.
I’ll leave all this Parliament stuff at that for now – and just hope that everyone reading this gets their ‘sport’ from mistletoe this season, acting properly of course. Otherwise Operation Mistletoe might be invoked!