Chairman denies sending letter to Dan Hodges

The chairman of the Tripe Marketing Board Sir Norman Wrassle has issued the following statement in connection with a draft letter which has been circulating in the social media:

Sir Norman Wrassle

"On Monday 24 September 2018 I was presented with a draft letter to send to Mr Dan Hodges of the Daily Mail. This followed discussions within our marketing team about how minor celebrities might be recruited to help the TMB promote tripe, perhaps by agreeing to become the Face of Tripe and to help us celebrate World Tripe Day on 24 October.

"It is important to recognise that I got as far as reading the words 'Mr DPJ Hodges' and 'Daily Mail' and read no further. This is because the TMB has a long-held policy of not advertising our product in that newspaper as we have learned that its readers are unable to distinguish between tripe and its editorial content.

"Nevertheless, the letter was somehow 'leaked' and has now been retweeted many times on Twitter. I would therefore like to apologise to tripe lovers across the country and reassure them that there are no serious attempts to associate Mr Hodges with our fine product."

Sir Norman has confirmed that an investigation has been opened to discover the source of the leak. The letter is reproduced below. If anyone has any information as to how it came to be made public, they should contact the TMB immediately.

Tripe Bursary Fund launched

The Tripe Marketing Board today announced the launch of a new Tripe Bursary Fund.  Grants of up to £500 per year are available for young people under the age of 18 to buy tripe who do not currently have access to it because they come from wealthy families who will not buy tripe or because they are being brought up by parents who are vegan.

Speaking at the launch event in Wigan earlier today, TMB chairman Sir Norman Wrassle said: "Many young people from wealthy families are denied the opportunity to eat tripe because their parents share the widely held perception that it is pauper's food.  Others - through accident of birth - find themselves locked into vegan families where they are prevented from eating tripe."

Sir Norman said that he hoped the new fund would break down the barriers that prevent young people from trying tripe. "The application process is simple. We'll only need to see their parents' last two years tax returns, and if they earn more than £100,000 per annum and have paid little or no tax, they'll qualify as wealthy," he said.

Applicants from vegan families can supply meat- and dairy-free shopping receipts for the last 12 months.  

TMB Chairman denies charges of anti-veganism

2013 Speech

Tripe Marketing Board chairman Sir Norman Wrassle today firmly rejected accusations that he believes British vegans lack a sense of humour.

The suggestions were made after a recording surfaced of a speech Sir Norman gave to the British Comedy Food Awards in December 2013, when tripe narrowly lost out to bananas as the nation's favourite comedy foodstuff.

Sir Norman said his reference to "humourless, skinny and pasty-faced" vegans were directed exclusively at the small minority of vegans who had pelted him with tofu on his arrival at the ceremony, and not at the wider vegan community.

He accused Offal Monthly, which has reprinted his comments in its September issue, of deliberately trying to stir up antagonism between tripe lovers and vegans. "No one has worked harder than I to rebuild trust between tripe and the vegan community," he said, pointing to the significant representation of vegans and vegetarians on the Board.  He added: "Not that I'm conflating the two - I fully realise that while all vegans are in some sense vegetarian, not all vegetarians are vegan."

Sir Norman defended his attack on the militant vegans who have continued to plague his public appearances and which led to him having to answer questions from the Board about the size of his expense claim for dry cleaning alone.

 "I maintain that these particular individuals are vile and irresponsible.  I've tried many times to hold out the olive branch to them, but every time they merely snatch it away and proceed to make a tasty tapenade," he said.