the brilliantly leaping gazelle

Just heard the news that Teresa May is to resign. Not immediately, but on June 7th. It makes me think of someone in a relationship they know is going to end, but they’ve got a holiday booked, so they’ll wait until they’re back before dumping them. They’ve told their family and all their friends, who are relieved that finally they’re following their advice to end it, because it was an increasingly unhealthy relationship. Of course they’ll keep schtum.

Actually, her announcing her intention to quit, but without actually quitting is sort of emblematic of her sorry stint as Prime Minister. Not only has she ruined what otherwise promised to be a gloriously sunny Bank Holiday weekend, but she has unleashed a leadership contest that will both create parliamentary paralysis when we can least afford the stasis, and will produce a non leader leader, someone unable to deliver what’s so desperately needed.

Talk about a poisoned chalice!

Caveat emptor is struck me earlier today as I thought about the Brexit party, because it literally means ‘Let the buyer beware’

Because, as the Daily Telegraph noted, when attempting ti inform its readers of what the Brexit parties policies were,

They don’t have any. The Brexit Party isn’t a party in the traditional sense, and Mr Farage has chosen to emulate the Vote Leave campaign by deliberately steering clear of details.

Adding,

Instead, the campaign focuses on attacking Westminster politicians and on the “betrayal” of the Brexit vote. While Mr Farage hasn’t offered up any solutions to the Brexit conundrum, he has made clear that he is in favour of the hardest Brexit possible.

Before helpfully clearing things up by adding,

He has also promised a “full slate” of policies once the European elections are out of the way. He told a rally in West Yorkshire that they would include “political reform, more help for the regions, scrapping of ludicrous projects like HS2”.

One charitable interpretation of this is that as their single aim is for the want the U.K will hopefully leave the E.U. soon, they don’t have to. However, if they do so well that it triggers a ‘no confidence’ vote in the government, and that in turn triggers a general election, and that in turn uses up time better spent on sorting things, then is it a good use of the vote?

Essentially a vote for the Brexit Party may on the face of it appear to returning democracy to the people, but my concern is that it is anything but. Do I trust him? Not in the slightest! How can possibly trust some who fanny’s about with something as basic as the pronunciation of their surname.  As I noted in 2014,

How do you pronounce garage? Go on – try it out loud, I’m in no hurry. Done it? If you’re anything like me, then your pronunciation of garage will have sounded like how the word porridge sounds. But on the other hand, if you’re Nigel Farage then your surname sounds as if a pirate has hijacked it with the result that Farage becomes Faraaarhhge. Somehow he’s managed to convince every media outlet, every political commentator that his name is not pronounced the way it is spelt.Before I start, here’s your starter for ten? How do you pronounce garage? Go on – try it out loud, I’m in no hurry. Done it? If you’re anything like me, then your pronunciation of garage will have sounded like how the word porridge sounds. But on the other hand, if you’re Nigel Farage then your surname sounds as if a pirate has hijacked it with the result that Farage becomes Faraaarhhge. Somehow he’s managed to convince every media outlet, every political commentator that his name is not pronounced the way it is spelt.

And if if can do that, what else might he be capable of? That’s the thing. No one knows.

Oh, by the way, just because I don’t like him, or what he might do or his potential effect on the body politic, or his lowest common denominator rhetoric, or his view that the N.H.S. should be privatised it doesn’t mean that somehow my antipathy toward him extends to those who reluctantly voted for the Brexit party out of a deeply held personal conviction that the result of the referendum was being betrayed, then I don’t hate you.

I hate you more than that! (And you know who you are!)

When I was in a medically induced coma for a month after my accident, they had to put a tube down my throat to help me breath,  but whilst essential to keeping me alive then, now it has had a a rather unfortunate consequence on my speech. Also when I woke up, it was discovered that the part of my brain responsible for movement and co-ordination had been damaged. That’s enough to be going with.

Thankfully, my powers of critical thinking, logical deduction, and consequential reasoning were pretty much the same as they were. Thats why there was no realistic prospect whatsoever for me voting for the Nigel Farrages Brexit Party, not just because he looks like Kermit the Frog, not just because he has a surname that sounds like some cheap copy of chocolates that Excellency’s spoil us with, and not because because, as I wrote in the less divisive climate of 2014;

Nigel likes to prove his man of the people credentials as often as possible, either being interviewed or photographed in a pub and is often seen drinking a pint. Is it only me that remembers that photo’s of that well regarded humanitarian Tony Blair , albeit onebeing photographed with a mug of tea, strumming a guitar, or famously, when walking with the peace loving George Bush, having both hands tucked rather too self consciously into his jeans. Only me, I suppose who thinks that any politician who wants to appear like a ‘pretty regular kind of guy’’ – as Blair claimed to be – is usually anything but.

Because, who knows, it might just be me being cynical, maybe he really is a regular man of the people, albeit one who went to Dulwich college (a public school) and upon leaving  embarked on a career as a trader in brokerage firms on the London Metal Exchange. This is the sole extent of his working history until he became an MEP (a Member of the European Parliament).. A politician who went to public school and then worked in the city before becoming a politician. Sound familiar? Or am I just being cynical?

Not only is it because, as I wrote in 2014

Only a cynic would point out that that is why his personal details are a suitably vague. Equally, if ones main hobby-horse is to bang on about a little Europe has done for this country, and how Britain would be better off divorcing ourselves from a political union with Europe, the last thing you want known is that not only do you command a large salary from being an MEP  – over £78,000 per year. (That’s not including paying your wife up to – no-ones quite sure – £20,00 a year for being your secretary) Or that your voting record is only 45.57%

No, what you wouldn’t want known by a public outraged by M.P’s expenses, was that you’d claimed over £2million in expenses since riding the gravy train first class.

Nor is it because, as Jonathan Freedland in yesterdays Guardian, asked,

Why is Nigel Farage immune to scandals that would destroy his rivals?

just before going onto list them for us. I hadn’t paid much attention to the Aaron Banks paying for his chauffeur and car before, until I realised that if it was a smear, it was one that had benefited our man of the people £450,000!

No, it is because his brand of plain, honest speaking, that you can’t trust other politicians and because I’m not one of them, you can trust me, I understand your concerns, I get it is symptomatic of a right wing populist movement that’s gaining ground all over Europe. Under the guise of articulating whatever invented threat, exaggerated fear or existential threat that poses a threat to democratic norms that succeeds in garnering popular support, they’ll fan those flames whilst complaining about the damage the fire is causing.

And recent history has shown us where this kind of populist, rabble rousing can lead. No, not to Hitlers Germany. But we should’ve learnt from that before the horrors General Ratko Miadic, Bosnia, and ‘ethnic cleansing.’visited Europe. If we don’t learn from the past, we’ll repeat it and it’s only when we’ve reached the point of no return that people realise they’re on a slippery slope

Like I said I;m brain damaged, not mad.

The European elections on Thursday present me with something of a quandary. Not just because none of the choices are especially appealing, but also that voting in an election is such a fundamental belief, that not to do so would be almost as bad as admitting that homeopathy is a science, that ghosts are real, religion isn’t just arrant nonsense or that Elvis isn’t dead.

Any party that has as a campaign pledge to consider, or to outright commit to having a ‘peoples vote’ is a party I don’t want to be invited to, given that I believe that the first referendum result gave a clear indication of the will of the people. I voted to remain, but unlike those calling for a second referendum, I dealt with the fact I was on the losing side, because in a democracy, not everyone gets what they want. If someone wins, it follows that someone loses. Had the rules of the referendum stipulated the minimum winning margin for it to be legal, fair enough, run it again. Equally, the rules said that in the event of a “Leave’ vote, a withdrawal agreement with the E.U. would be negotiated and then a confirmatory vote put to the people once they’d seen the deal, great.

But there wasn’t .

And if there is one thing that is going to communicate to communities throughout the land that the Westminster political elite isn’t listening to them – or doesn’t like what it hears – and ignores their wishes using highly spurious and condescending reasons to justify their shameful betrayal, then holding a second referendum is certain to do it. And a betrayal is exactly what it is. If this were happening in Turkey, then the same people who call for a second referendum here would be denouncing it as undemocratic. (Actually, that’s not a good example, given how the wrong candidate won the Istanbul mayoral election, causing their electoral stooges to declare it void and be run again….)

Which is not a universally popular view, not least when you share a house with two staunch believers in the necessity of there being second referendum. So on Thursday I am faced with an unenviable choice. Either I void the ballot paper, or vote for the Brexit Party, in which case it would be a case of that old political adage of holding your nose while you vote.

Sunday the 26^th at 10pm should be quite interesting, because that is when the results will be announced! Not only will we see how people here have voted, but where. If it transpires that not only is there a north/south divide, but also a town/country divide and additionally a young/old divide, I look forward with relish to the various competing and contradictory explanations used by all sides to persuade us that the results do/don’t mean what they do in fact mean.

Speaking of which, one inevitably thinks of Liberal Democrats and their so-called triumph in the local elections. They were nothing of the sort, because local elections are second-tier elections, they’re the political equivalent of being chosen for the second XI at school. And the Liberal Democrats are neither liberal nor democratic, as proven by their insistence on ignoring the will of the people, using craven and patronizing objections to justify their frankly incredibly intolerant position. Quite why anyone would trust them again after their ill-fated coalition with the Conservative Party is beyond me, being as how they have as much credibility as a crystal healer.

It’s the little things, always the little things, which ruin an otherwise gloriously sunny day. So I’m going to write about it, in the foolishly optimistic hope that doing so will help calm the maelstrom of rage building up inside of me.

I was in the garden earlier and what with it being all sunny and warm, decided that listening to ‘The World at One’ was called for. I went back inside, got my radio, took it outside, and discovered it wasn’t working. So I went back inside, got my solar powered radio, and listened to the news. Bingo!

After the news had finished, I decided to change the batteries, despite there being a nagging doubt that my use of it couldn’t possibly have worn them out. Or could it? That’s the thing with a nagging doubt; it nags and then doubts itself

Anyway.

I opened the back of the radio and discovered that instead of there being the expected four batteries, there were in fact three. Whilst being momentarily dumbfounded, it soon dawned on me, that this could not have been an accident. I mean, one doesn’t accidentally remove the cover to the batteries and then accidentally take one out. Swearing heralded this realization.

I tried to think of a charitable explanation that might prove satisfactory, but came there none.

Possibly you’re thinking ‘He’s been quick to blame it on a person unknown.’, but consider this. At the same time as buying the radio, I also bought four rechargeable batteries for it, reasoning I could recharge them in one go. Now I’m wondering ‘What possible use could someone have with one rechargeable battery?’

It’s the little things. It’s always the little things.

Of course I could write about yesterdays warning from the Environment Agency that predicted to increase our spending on climate change defences to roughly £1 billion a year. I could of course point out that this government has pledged £2.6 billion over the next 6 years for this. Additionally, the report also warned that the U.K would have to sacrifice roughly 1.5 million homes that were located in coastal areas at risk of flooding. But that would force me could to point out that whilst the Chancellor in his last Budget stated that 300,000 new homes need be built each year, that in 2017 200,000 new homes were built.

I’d then be left with no choice but to point out the shocking – but unsurprising – fact that of these new homes, the number of low cost social housing new builds was just 1,456 in 2017. In the part of London in which I live yes, there are new builds going up all the time, but are they affordable to any local people? No. Whilst the building hoardings might feature young people doing young people things yet nowhere is there any sign of any older or disabled people to be seen. Its clear who their target market is. I could write about all that in a rather withering way, of course I could, but I’m not going to.

Instead I’m going to write about my journey from my home to Greenwich yesterday. This was attempted by myself, my housemate on my adult tricycle. Whilst it looking a bit worse for wear and somewhat heavy my housemate nonetheless has many redeeming features, the bike less so! Whilst the weather forecast predicted ‘light showers’, it neglected to add that the showers were light for a monsoon season in Singapore, so with a naïve optimism that was to be soon cruelly exposed, we set off.

We’d only been cycling for 10mins when it began to rain. Now I’m not talking drizzle here; I’m talking about rain that is both bearable and highly suggestive of a lot worse to follow. That kind of rain. The kind of rain that most sensible people would take heed of and turn back. The sort of rain that might cause someone to look at their clothing and ask themselves ‘Am I prepared for what might happen?’

But no. And the main drawback of my bike is that whilst there is room for two control freaks to use it, there is only one set of controls and unfortunately I wasn’t in control of them! We ploughed on. Fortunately we were assisted in our endeavors by Transport for London who furnished us with a paper map that in the rain began to lose as much integrity asRichard Nixon. So, the omens were good.

The rain got heavier and more insistent. Without wishing to blow my own trumpet – and when anyone says they don’t wish to do something, it means they are going to do the very thing they don’t wish to do – I’ve always been of the belief that whilst you can’t control external events, you can however choose what comes out of your mouth. By this I mean that you can either inflame or diffuse a situation by what you say – or don’t say – and if you choose to say it with a self deprecating sense of humour so much the better. To achieve maximum success in this laudable endeavour, all concerned are both aware of what you are doing and also able to do it themselves. I’d like to say that my companion was so minded, like being the operative word. I of course joke (or am I?).

Anyway, we navigated our way through bits of South London until quite by chance we happened upon a quiet route – a specifically designed cycle route that is designed to afford busy roads and the like. It’s one of the joys of getting cheerfully lost. Sometimes you just get lost, but at other times you happen upon something unexpectedly wonderful, which this was. The stares of people as we passed them in the torrential rain was something to behold, or would have been had I had been able to see them clearly.  I fondly imagined that they were looking on with a mixture of awe and astonishment as we passed them by; however, the realistic part of me imagines they were thinking what sort of day release activity is this?

Anyway, we got to Greenwich, well, I say we got to Greenwich. Almost to Greenwich. So close but not really that we we were both of the opinion that the cycle route was designed by a man. The sort of man who, on a first date, takes you out, shows you a good time, so much so that you invite him back to your flat…and you have not an unreasonable expectation of how things will progress until he takes you so far and then when he’s finished he abruptly withdraws and leaves, leaving you feeling totally unfulfilled and slightly used.

We arrived at Greenwich and repaired to a nearby Starbucks for some much needed refreshments, some warmth and a toilet break. It was only then that we discovered how thoroughly soaked we were. There is nothing more dispiriting when you are cold and soaked through of needing to go the toilet with a sense of urgency that your jeans do not share! They are quite happy to be stuck to the skin making them hard to peel off and as your panic mounts so your fumbling’s become ever more incompetent and the jeans become ever more unyielding. Thankfully I managed to avoid disaster. The relief of a successful evacuation of the bladder was short lived because it struck me that the reverse of the process awaited me and whilst they were unyielding on the way down that is was nothing as to how uncooperative they were on the way back up.

So once we’d got a bit warmer and a bit drier, we set off for the return journey. It began thundering down. There is nothing like mild adversity of the non-life threatening variety to really add to one’s enjoyment of something.

Seriously.

Like me, did you spot the bitter irony of yesterday’s announcement of a royal birth coming on the same day as a report by the United Nations, which reported that the population of the world had doubled since 1970? And will reach 11 billion by 2050?

Like me, did you see this is a yet another sign that not only does the planet need humanity’s extinction, but that we are quite literally sowing the seeds of our own demise?

The single most effective action a human can take to reduce their individual carbon footprint – and if enough humans do it, it will have an immediate and lasting impact – isn’t by adopting a vegan diet, isn’t by cutting down on air travel or by switching to an electric car. Whilst those things are good in and of themselves, and might make one feel good talking about the sacrifices one’s made at a dinner party, that’s all it will do. Humans simply to have to stop having children.

As soon as one becomes a parent, whatever fine, reasoned and logical environmental principles one had, become abandoned in the pursuit of buying things for the child. It’s an inescapable fact. Children want, and parents want an easy life. The daughter of my house-mates is immeasurably adorable, but rather than looking at it on an individual basis, but as a whole, there is no denying the fact that far from being the future, they are in fact the cause of quite possibly there not being one. From time immemorial, people may have had children in part because they believed their children’s lives would be better than their own. How then, can one trust the judgment of someone who looks of the state of the world today and thinks ‘Yeah, I’ll bring a child into that!’.

Which is why the absence of any critical analysis of the royal birth is problematic. When they were engaged, it was widely suggested by assorted flunkeys and lickspittles that Meghan Markle would be a champion, using her new status to highlight issues. What she would champion and what those issues were, we were left to imagine. Had she said, when the world’s media was hanging on her every word, “We’ve decided not to have children, for the simple reason that the worlds population continues to outpace our ability to sustain it. Humanity faces many threats, all of them of our own making, and the future looks increasingly uncertain. I hope that our decision not to have children will empower others to make the same choice.”

But no. Their desire to procreate is symptomatic of a collective blinkeredness, a refusal to grasp the sheer magnitude of the problem.

If as a species we can identify the threats to our survival, can have broad consensus on what needs to be done to mitigate those threats, but don’t do them, we don’t deserve to survive.

To me, it’s that simple.

So today is the so called ‘Peoples Vote’ march in London in support of stoping Brexit by having another referendum and thus revoking the verdict of the genuine peoples vote.

Because the march today by isn’t the people who were on the winning side after the first referendum.  It’ll full of sore losers. Imagine if the leavers had lost by 4%? Would remain voters be so tolerant of their whinging?

And what about 33% of people who could vote in the referendum, but didn’t. They’ve somehow managed to avoid being denounced as the true enemies of democracy they are!

As any politician will tell you,the easier it is for someone to protest, the more they will ignore it. Signing ann online petition about anything is as much use as as a marzipan dildo. Companies are different, they have share-holders and profits to worry about. Politicians don’t. If someone sits down, writes a letter, and then posts it, a politician might notice that. because that requires some effort. Taking to the streets is another level of effort altogether. One has to devote a chunk of free time to participate in it, but also one has to get there and back. Politicians tend to notice that, except that noticing something and then acting upon it are two very different things.

Before the first Iraq war, over a million people took to the streets of London to make their opposition to it known and what was the result? I mean apart from being a bonanza for the people who printed off the ‘Stop The War’ placards. They made out like bandits! But otherwise, aside from worthy speeches from the sort of people who always made speeches at marches, nothing. The largest march ever in British history, and it didn’t stop the war. Despite Blair being such a fan of focus groups,  nothing.

If over 17 million people, the number of people who voted to leave the E.U take part in the march, well thats something. What that something is debatable. We could always have vote on it!

(This is facile in the extreme I know, but then so is calling for a second referendum but I have a fantasy of the marchers at the child’s school sports day, and demanding that the parents race be held again, not because they didn’t win it, but because the rules weren’t properly explained, or that the winner didn’t win by enough)

During the referendum campaign, one of arguments put forward by by the Leave campaign was that a vote to leave the E.U., would return sovereignty to parliament.

So it was with no little wonderment that I greeted Teresa Mays statement in Downing Street tonight, when she announced she was asking the EU. for an extension to enable her to get her Brexit deal through, and asserted that the public were sick of arcane procedural rules in parliament, which were used to prevent a third meaningful vote. On a deal that had been comprehensively defeated twice by parliament. That deal. Defeated in the parliament that was going to get its sovereignty back because of a leave vote. That one.

Still got a lot on my plate, but this caught my eye this morning and well, it seemed rude not to comment on it.

The BBC – along with other media outlets I presume – trumpeted the news that

The number of employed people in the UK has risen again, to a new record number of 32.7 million people between November and January, figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.
The 76.1% employment rate is the highest since records began in 1971.
ONS senior statistician Matt Hughes said: “The employment rate has reached a new record high, while the proportion of people who are neither working nor looking for a job – the so-called ‘economic inactivity rate’- is at a new record low.”
Employment Minister Alok Sharma said: “Today’s employment figures are further evidence of the strong economy the chancellor detailed in last week’s Spring Statement, showing how our pro-business policies are delivering record employment.”

Which on the face of it is good news, welcome as it is when this government is embroiled in a mess of its own making. But all is not what it seems. ‘Employment’ is, it seems, a ver elastic term, one is stretched to breaking point by the claim that employment is at its highest rate since 1971. Because, as the ONS helpfully clarifies

The number of people in employment in the UK is measured by the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and consists of people aged 16 years and over who did one hour or more of paid work per week

In what universe is one hours work a week employment? If I had time, I might provide figures for the Tex Credits bill, which is, after all, a government subsidy for employee’s for the low  wages paid to them by their employers.

But I don’t.