Please excuse any typographical mistakes in this entry. The sun is making it a little hard to see the screen on my laptop machine as I type to you from our home in Perpignan in the South of France, where the weather is simply glorious today. I hear it’s a little on the chilly side back home, so I offer you my most Corbynian nod of solidarity, but I think we’ll stay put for a little while. Although I do have some work to oversee at our property on Lesbos, where it’s even warmer…

Look, you know, look. I won’t take much of your time with this article – I want to get back to the beach – but I thought I should give you a few words of comfort in the aftermath of the terrible events in Paris this weekend. One of my advisers suggested I shouldn’t, as some people regard me as “some sort of comedian”, which is obviously nonsense, although it’s true that even some of my most serious statements have been laughed at in public meetings, but I think that’s just because the electorate is a little bit dim. So please understand that my remarks are about how we should respond to this appalling act of terrorism.

The attacks themselves are not a subject for humour. Their rationale appears to have been that bloody massacre is a legitimate way to counter the “prostitution and vice” of going to a restaurant, or a sporting or cultural event. The Deputy Mayor of Paris, agreeing with his President that this was an act of war, quoted Churchill’s line that “this is not the end, nor the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning”. The great American stateswoman Madonna observed at her concert the next night that no-one in the world has the right to stop us doing what we love.

And that’s the point.

The murders are not a subject for humour. But humour and art and fun are also under attack, so I say we use them in our Resistance. I don’t believe anyone has ever said this before, but it is my belief that one has to fight… for one’s right… to partake in the rich cultural life of our society, which we all value so highly. So don’t change your habits. Don’t stop laughing. Don’t let them win. Fight those who would have you do otherwise. Fight them with your lifestyle and beliefs and behaviour. We must fight them in the bistros, in the galleries and restaurants and bars. We’ll fight them in the zoos and the theme parks, the theatres and cabaret clubs. And we shall never surrender.

All we have to offer, ladies and gentlemen, is sweat, tears and Facebook filters. At long last, no-one will be offended if you remove your rainbow-hued photos. Together, let us SHARE those memes, LIKE those rants, and NEVER, EVER click on anything by Britain First! We shall, I promise, overcome.

Cheerio.

Magnus Turner MP