The Navy’s Batchelor Boy Empties Ahmadinejad’s Pockets
“I ONLY got enough money for a few driving lessons,” says Able Seaman Arthur Batchelor, now free from his Iran ordeal.
While blonde Faye Turney’s tale of missing her daughter and her clean knickers earned her £80,000, Batchelor, a father of none and more opaque on the underwear issue, has not been so fortunate.
Pictured in the Mirror in his Man At Ahmadinejad suit, the pockets pulled out to show how empty they are (and that no bombs are secreted within), Batchelor tells all.
“People think I’m some kind of millionaire now,” says Batchelor, “dining out on lobster and champagne – but I’m not.”
Perhaps we have been blinded by that ill-fitting suit. Never mind the length, says Batchelor, get a load of the quality.
Batchelor is now at home, or at least in a 1.7 nautical mile radius of it.
“The money I’ve received will simply pay for a few driving lessons,” says he. “I’m not even sure it will cover the cost of the actual test, let alone a car.”
And then Batchelor says something illuminating. Listen to this: “I see the payment more as compensation for spending the time telling my story to reporters when I should have been out with my family and friends.”
The money is not a reward for a job done, some would say badly, but cash that will in some way salve the pain of speaking to Fleet Street’s finest.
Batchelor wants nothing from his time in captivity at the hands of the unhinged Ahmadinejad. But shut him a room with the Mirror’s reporter and he wants compensation.
What do you make of that?
Posted: 11th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids Comment (1) | TrackBack | Permalink
