It wasn't entirely a serious comment but thanks for "filling me in".

Margaret Thatcher (our own dear leader) was keen to talk about the "trickle down effect" - as the rich got richer then so would the poor. It also worked for the trickle down effect of the water from the roof of the South Bank Centre in London onto the homeless souls in the cardboard city below - I suppose that's the problem with such expressions. Her successor was keen on a classless society and tried the phrase "back to basics" to make us feel more moral. It took his party back to basics in parliament - he lost most of his cabinet in a torrent of "sleeze" cases as they failed to demonstrate their moral fibre.

Any idea when "sleeze" became such a popular word?