Sherlock Holmes and the Streatham Area Committee

I’m a Sherlock Holmes fan. It was a maxim of his, who according to Conan Doyle’s stories visited Streatham once or twice, that “when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

At the Streatham Area Committee this evening, I was quietly reflecting that the Lib Dems should follow the Great Detective’s guidance, instead of posturing endlessly with their own brand of “truth”, which relies on whatever is most improbable, without eliminating anything, except the truth.

As an example of Lib Dem truth management, one of their number said the Area Committee is a great example of local democracy in action, even though members of the public who come to its meetings can usually be counted on the fingers of one hand.

If tumbleweed had rolled through that room, it would not have seemed out of place. Indeed, it would probably have contributed something more constructive than the average Lib Dem councillor.

Why was I thinking about Sherlock Holmes? No idea, but it turns out by freaky coincidence that on this day in 1863, the painter Horace Vernet died in Paris. Sherlock Holmes once told Dr Watson that: “my grandmother ... was the sister of Vernet, the French artist.”

Leaving the fictional great-nephew issue aside, Vernet once refused Louis Napoleon’s request that he erase an inconvenient person from one of his paintings by saying “I will not violate the truth.”

If only the Lib Dems were so principled. Or indeed, principled.