I knew Billy was fishy, but I didn’t realise he was this fishy

“Dear Billy, sorry to hear your news. But I haven’t forgotten our bet, and look forward to lunch at a date to be determined. Yours ever, Matthew"

The tunnel leading into the vault at the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit company in London (Metropolitan Police)

The soundest dictum known to this trade was coined by Andreas Whittam Smith, a founder of this paper, when he memorably described an open letter from a journalist as an act of madness. Yet Andreas may forgive me for ignoring him today since, for reasons soon to become clear, this seems the only feasible way of contacting the recipient. So then…

“Dear Billy, sorry to hear your news. But I haven’t forgotten our bet, and look forward to lunch at a date to be determined. Yours ever, Matthew.” The determining will be done shortly by a High Court judge, the said Billy Lincoln having been found guilty last week of offences connected with the Hatton Garden heist. As for the bet, it was struck last May at the Porchester Spa, the Turkish baths in London’s lascivious Bayswater where Billy and I bonded over shared martyrdom to gastro-oesophageal reflux disorder (please God the screws are giving him his daily 20mg of omeprazole).

We had less in common on the political front, the 60-year-old’s views on immigration and other contentious matters being more robust than my own, and clashed good-naturedly about the imminent election led to the wager. “That Ed Miliband, ’e’s f****** useless,” posited Bill. “The Tories will get a majority.” I pompously cited the opinion polls. “Don’t talk bollocks, Maffhugh,” was the tart rejoinder. “The Tories will win, no question. If they don’t I’ll buy you lunch.”

And if they do, I said, I’ll buy you lunch at the fish restaurant of your choice. Bill loves his fish. As Woolwich Crown Court learned, his Porchester nickname is “Billy the Fish” due to his sadly interrupted habit of going to Billingsgate market most mornings at 4am to buy fish wholesale, for himself and for subsequent resale to fellow spa-goers.

A few days after the election, he strode up to my lounger. “There you go,” he said, handing over a bag, “I was dahn Billingsgate this morning, and picked you out a Dover sole.” It was enormous, and I asked what I owed him. “Don’t be a muppet,” said Billy. “It’s a gift.” I thanked him, and congatulated him on his election forecasting skills. An hour later in the steam room, I mentioned the sole to a third party. “Yeah, Billy’s suddenly come over dead generous,” said this character. “He keeps buying all the boys drinks and snacks. Never seen him so chipper.”

He was nicked the following day, and we never did make that date. So if you’re one of our many readers in HMP Belmarsh, send Billy my fond regards, and tell him I look forward to lunch in six or seven years. Assuming time off for good behaviour.

Croissants are the new hammer and sickle

Jeremy Corbyn continues to draw fire from the age’s most powerful political intellects. A certain Lord Watts, some kind of newly ennobled party apparatchik, warns the leader to “take less notice of the London-centric, hard-Left political class who sit around in their £1m mansions, eating their croissants at breakfast”. It’s hard to pinpoint when or how the croissant joined the hammer and sickle in communist iconography. But if Watts thinks £1m buys a mansion in Islington, he wants reminding to take his meds.

Newly sacked shadow minister Michael Dugher, who approvingly tweets Watts’ meisterwork, thunders about the iniquity of changing the policy on Trident. How the front bench will cope without the genius who ran Andy Burnham’s wildly successful leadership campaign is anyone’s guess. As for Simon Danczuk, the Don Juan of Rochdale reportedly means to challenge his party suspension by citing the fact that John Prescott suffered no such punishment over his affair with a secretary.

Quite right. Having a consensual affair with a mature co-worker, sexting a 17-year-old looking for a job in your office… yup, that’s the same. Corbyn has his problems, but you cannot deny he’s unusually blessed when it comes to his enemies.

Boris knows how to dodge a hospital pass

Skirmishing for the Tory succession warms up with reports of a George Osborne plot against his main rival. The Government’s chief executive to David Cameron’s non-executive chairman apparently wants to sack Jeremy Hunt as Health Secretary, despite his bang up job in defusing the NHS as a political issue, and replace him with Boris Johnson. It’s a delectably subtle ruse but it won’t work. After rejecting the high-risk option of leading the EU “out” campaign, Boris would hardly accept what “a friend” wittily describes as “literally a hospital pass”. However paralysed he is by lack of personal ambition, he’s far too nimble to blunder into one of Osborne’s bear traps.

Fear no more the heat of the Sun

These are words I can barely type even after a slug of Famous Grouse, but the Sun on Sunday and star columnist Louise Mensch have parted company. There has been no formal statement from News Corporation yet – but when there is, it will presumably emulate Chelsea FC on the recent departure of Jose Mourinho, with a reference to “mutual consent”.

By unanimous consent, the former Tory MP was the finest Sun commentator since Jon Gaunt. If there is a consolation, she will continue to delight us with her immaculately well-informed tweets. But Sundays will never be quite the same.