Last July when the Tour de France swept through town, thousands of people turned out to see the cyclists whizz past in a matter of seconds.

But what made the riders travel so fast? Of course it was their legs pedalling furiously.

This week we’ve seen two politicians, who for very different reasons I would imagine wish they could do the same as the cyclists – only in reverse.

First up is Tory candidate Afzal Amin. Things were looking rosy for the former British Army officer contesting Dudley North.

His Labour opponent, Ian Austin, had the slimmest majority of just 649 and would nervously have been looking over his shoulder.

But the Mail on Sunday revealed that Mr Amin had been in negotiations with the EDL over a proposed march against a new mosque in the town where he hoped to be an MP.

The allegation was that the right-wing group would announce a march against said mosque with all attendant jingoism and then our erstwhile politico would then say his intervention had seen it cancelled.

Mr Amin was on video promising to be an “unshakeable ally” for the EDL and promising to get their views heard in Parliament.

He denies the plot and saying the video was an “inaccurate picture of reality.”

Instead he, somewhat perplexingly said: “If people do announce that they are going to do an action, and other people disagree with it, then they sit together and they resolve their differences and the action is then stopped; then this helps the communities feel that ‘yes, on the other side there is a working partner we can work with’.

“That’s what we were trying to stage-manage.”

That’s what the British people like, Mr Amin: The feeling that the real events in their lives are being stage-managed so that they actually have no real say.

If he’s now out of work, I’d suggest he gets himself to the new cemetery near Castle Hill with his spade, because it appears every time he opens his mouth he digs a little bit further.

On the complete flip side of this particular political coin in Simon Danczuk.

Labour MP Simon Danczuk

The Rochdale MP, who is probably best known for his buxom wife’s selfies, landed himself in hot water this week with Ed Miliband. And Harriet Harman. And basically everybody connected the Labour Party.

In an interview an “emotional” Mr Danczuk told how he believed that Ed Miliband turned off voters and was seen as more of a toff than David Cameron. Which is quite some achievement.

Not content with that little line which is sure to get Ed’s advisors’ cheeks as red as their political leanings, he then went on, saying: “Any Labour politician that says to you they knock on a door and Ed Miliband is popular are telling lies. They’re just telling lies.”

Oh sweet lord, he’s gone and done it now.

But rather than back down at this point Mr Danczuk appears to have decided he may be hung for a sheep as a lamb and began poking his oar into the time the party leader posed with The Sun.

Mr Miliband later apologised but not before deputy leader Harriet Harman had initally backed him then, following the glorious leader’s volte face, agreed he shouldn’t.

Mr Danczuk’s take on the affair?

“It’s that sort of double speak from politicians: How could he be right on both counts? That turns people off politics.

“So when somebody hears a politician say that, you know what they think, if you pardon the language: ‘What a f****** knob’.

“That’s the reality of it.”

When it dawned on Mr Danczuk what he’d done I’d like to think he went ashen faced and did a double take like in the films.

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The honest answer is that he’s probably spent the best part of this week apologising to his overlords – for simply telling the truth.

The straight-talking MP told it how it was. Mr Miliband has all the charisma of a stamp collecting oyster which is training to be an accountant.

Harriet Harman’s word was shattered when she U-turned and most of the population who saw her probably thought of her in his somewhat industrial term above.

For all Mr Danczuk’s gaffes I’d rather have a bloke who gets into trouble for telling it how ‘it’ is, rather than a bloke who wants to make ‘it’ something that does’t exist so he can hoodwink you into believing whatever he decides to stage-manage.

And if Mr Danczuk finds himself out on his ear at the next election – which is unlikely as I can only see people responding to his honesty – he should take Mr Amin’s spade because really can dig himself a hole.