[theo_luddite]

He doesn't get "there's no smoke without fire". Or if he does, he denies that he either saw or smelled the smoke in the first place, let alone the flames licking round his ankles.

When the question was first raised in Parliament - his stock answer was to lie and deny. He didn't get that the question wouldn't have ever been raised if there wasn't already knowledge of the party's. Hell, you can't have that many people around getting pissed as parrots and not have someone either blab about it or quite rightly raise concerns about them happening, especially as it was happening on a regular basis.