Heaven help us.

How sensitive as nation we have become. 

It all seems a million miles from when I was growing up in the same country. It's as if a script written by the Brothers Grimm had taken hold of the nation where each move each sentence each thought process is interrogated by a particular section of the society, sifted, examined and judged. They pronounce their verdict and a person is damned and vilified or acclaimed and honoured in a way which would do justice to the Stasi.

This filter through which we see others and others see us, is propagated by the media but whilst we are asked to join in the rules for judging must have come from somewhere else, some other powerful entity must have been at work convincing us that these rules of thought and behaviour are a bedrock for all "civilised people" to live by.

It doesn't matter if common sense contradicts  the rule or if the natural instinct makes one reject the condemnation or praise, because we have now this 'cultural manuscript' which defines us in all things. Any dissent is deemed corrosive to the common good and therefore has to be punished.

My latest reason to pull my hair out (I would be so lucky) is the shrill pronouncements today aimed at one of the contestants for the Prime Ministers job, Andrea Leadsom who in a long interview with a newspaper hack,  said she thought that a woman who had had the experience of raising children was, better placed by the experience than someone who hasn't had children. 

It's a reasonable statement since the job of bringing up your own kids is unique in some ways but common to a very large segment of any society and therefore gives one a shared experience. 

The opposite could also be said, since there is a growing number of woman who do not want to have children and who feel that having children is such a commitment that it gets in the way of the opportunity to devote their time to your own personal journey , demanding so much that the things they want to do, have to be at best postponed, at worst  written off.

The argument is particularly a question that only a woman can answer since a man assumes that most of the things he might like to do with his life is nor effected by having a family and other than affordability.  He can play the role of being a father without much trouble or hindrance to his self styled plans.

The problem arose because the woman inferred in Leadsom's aside to the reporter was Teresa May who sadly 'can not' have children and therefore the remark was unsuitable at best and downright crass at worst.

Our language is littered with things we can not say these days for fear of offending. 

In some ways this is a good thing since we would not want to offend anyone, well at least offend anyone who appears on a long list of specialised non-offendables.  If your not on the list, its 'open season. 

The people who offend the most, the reporters and columnist who daily pronounce on subjects which hurt and dismay whole sections of society are the very ones who are now on their high horse demanding that Leadsom is not PM material. 

It seems crazy that as a society we are now so led by the nose like donkey's.   That this handful of journalists weald so much power and influence to persuade.  It's as if there was a new religion born and these people are the 'high priests', holding the book of do's and don't's on what we can and can't think, an ongoing work in progress as we are all corralled into an ever tighter fit of politically correct uniformity.

Heaven help us. 

McCarthyism.

Watching a Parliamentary committee interrogating Jeremy Corbyn yesterday, I was struck by what a vituperous group politicians are when they think they have someone caught in their political headlights.

The case Mr Corbyn had to answer was, is the Labour Party racist and more specifically is it anti-semite. 
Racism is a hot topic around the dinner tables of the political class, sadly much more so than the devastation of George Osborn's savage cuts to welfare have been to the working class areas, particularly in the North but then the ideological juices are inflamed much more when the damage is seen to be done outside the confines of ones own territory simply because, all it demands is rhetoric and little action.

Irrespective of context or the local conditions on the ground, anti-Semitic judgements are held non rigour by swathes of people, in part because of the tragedy of the holocaust, in part because Hezbollah, representing the Palestinians have made plain their determined to wipe out the Jewish nation. In this context the tragedy of the Palestinians is brushed off and the hard line enactment of Israeli policy is never felt to be sufficiently brutal for people to fall into the anti-Israeli camp, as it seems certain members of the Labour Party have shown and voiced sympathy for.  

Corbyn, in being questioned by the committee was the centre of both, right wing conservative vitriol whilst, at the same time, he also came under attack from the labour members of the committee because he has become reviled by the the Blairites for shifting the Party away from the centrist-right policies which the "Son of Thatcher" had propagated.  

I have watched many committee meetings but rarely has it been so clearly evident that the people asking the questions were not interested in the response and were there simply to carry out a kicking. Unfortunately for them Corbyn is no fool and in my opinion stood his ground in defending himself and the party he leads, but it is symptomatic that when the nation needs everyone to pull together and form some sort of economic cohesion we would rather stand at each other's throats over that invasive, overpowering modern phenomena "political correctness" which makes us all cuckold to the real dilemmas within our society.

At least McCathy in America had one obsession, communism within the American society.  In the UK the hydra has many heads and many enemy's and the tragedy is that tiptoeing the line to avoid condemnation makes everyone an enemy of himself.

The stimulus we need

What I fail to understand is how duped we can be and what short memories we have.
During the BREXIT referendum a number of Tory MPs formed a group to campaign for the country to leave the EU. For many it was a difficult decision because it meant breaking with the Prime Minister for which their jobs would now become at risk.
The accusations hurled at each other were quite vitriolic, each camp wheeling one after another of their clan to denounce the other side as liars, hair brained or demented and it was hard to see how the Tory Party could stick itself back together again. 



One person who was almost invisible in the fracas was Teresa May the Home Office Minister. She avoided overtly siding with Cameron although she was thought to be against the leave campaign and sat it out on the sidelines. Now she is gathering votes from the parliamentarians to become the front runner to take over Cameron's job with the main responsibility to anchor the negotiations for our exit and any new relationship we can evolve with the EU.
It's strange to me, unless this is some sort of stitch up to try to continue as before, that not only is her heart not in the job, and here Cameron deserves a lot of praise for recognising it was not appropriate for him to head such a negotiation, it hardly seems appropriate for her to head up a reformed Government. Whilst she deliberately kept such a low profile it does not absolve her from her stance that whilst the other politicians were nailing their colours to the mast, she was "sitting on the fence".
Andrea Leadsom was always seen as a person who not only believed in coming out from the EU but was positive about our chances of succeeding as an economic state outside the Union. Her background in the financial services and in fact, having a background in anything at all outside politics puts her in a favourable position to negotiate a reasonable economically viable exit.
One of the phenomena which has raised its head is that we don't have sufficient well trained business and trade negotiators within the Civil Service to close the deals with other countries. It's a bit like a prisoner leaving prison after a long stretch where everything was done for him and now he has to do it for himself. The straight jacket of the EU has made us economically illiterate in forming trade deals. This from a country which initiated trade across the world, we have become lazy and economically inarticulate.
There have been offers from the Scandinavian countries to send in teams to bolster our lack of experience and it goes to show when you descend into the 'gravy chain' you become complacent and second best. One of the opportunities arising from a break away will be the necessity to retrain ourselves in the world of trade where the skill of a 'long term' success is the 'terms' you acquire.
I see on the front page of the Telegraph a small item of news which to my mind should have been the headline. It reported the Chinese as saying they looked forward to entering negotiations with the U.K. because their experience of negotiating with the EU had been slow and too drawn out.
To give the nation the boost it needs after all the doom and gloom of the past few months stories like this are vital but instead we have pages of news and comment on the Chilcot Report which, whilst important, deals with the "past" and Tony Blairs determination to go to war with George Bush against Saddam Hussain. The important statement regarding the Chinese approach to trading with us, in stark contrast to the Americans (our friends) who maintain we must "go to the back of the queue" and should be front page news, whilst Chilcot , reserved for the centre spread.

A vote of thanks.

Doom and gloom were the almost unanimous outpouring of the Observer this week.
The Observer is the Guardians Sunday paper and one would have thought that a referendum vote of 52%,  asking to leave would have provoked  a story that needed investigating.
But no, the status quo, market led story of crisis and financial mayhem was virtually the only story on offer. It was depressing that the columnists not only saw our future entirely in terms of the EU market but were convinced that whole swathes of industry and foreign investment would 'up sticks' and move onto the mainland as soon as possible.
The lack of inward investment,( part of the money we get back after paying our Community subs ) into this country from the EU would leave beneficiaries such as University's and the poor areas in the UK which benefit as recipients of a special fund to help poorly performing areas within Europe, that these payments will cease and the poor who live within these areas will be devastated.
This begs the question that being a net contributor I.e.  we put in more money than we get out, then the investment is still within our gift and can be carried on without it going to the EU first. Of course this raises the even bigger question, would our government be so socially minded, or do we have such a poor record of caring for our own, without the EU social commitment, that the the money will be spent on "glory projects" such as the 'high speed link to the North' and 'Trident'.
The world is neither black or white but a dirty shade of grey and those looking for black and white answers will be disappointed but it is within our gift to organise our affairs to suite the needs of the country. As we emerged from a crippling war in which we were in debt to the USA up, well above our heads and for which, unlike Germany we had to pay back in full  we slowly developed the markets to sell into in a world which hadn't discovered consumerism and the personal debt associated with the credit card. Now the world is awash with credit (and debt) with highly populated nations also having learned to live beyond their means, also needing to please its own population with consumerism.
The world has changed from the austerity of the 1940s to one in which there are more Rolls Royce sold to people outside the G8 group and where wealth has changed the geo political balance from what it used to be when we sought entry into the Common Market which was in those days other, than the US, the most lucrative market in the world.
With unemployment and the disequilibrium caused by the Euro effecting virtually all the 27 countries which now make up the Union it is very questionable whether the EU can continue for much longer without the full federalisation, a union where individual nations will loose all but in name their identity and the individual control of their sovereign parliaments. This synthesising of nations is being carried on by an 'elite' without much consideration of the will of their people and there is a growing call for proper discussion amongst the electorate as to the future direction of travel. Whether the EU breaks up or becomes more German centric with the northern countries forming their own economic block is to be seen.
Perhaps Nigel Farage  was perceptive and we all owe him a vote of thanks. 

Where is the truth

Reading this mornings Sunday newspaper, (The Observer) it's the first opportunity for the hacks to 'vent' and one is struck by the damage that polarisation in politics and much else inflicts on society.
The word truth seems to mean different things to different people and yet each opposing opinion claims its own position to have acquired the elixir of truth and reading the columnists and experts one is struck by the surety each has of their position. 

Hope in the uplands, or pain and damnation, seems the order of the day and each piece is eloquently crafted, the words chosen carefully to accentuate a 'specific position' regardless of any other viewpoint.
This "all or nothing" which so reflects our Parliamentary debating chamber is a point scoring game rather than an attempt to find solutions. Solutions might just mean you accept the other person is right on this particular matter and that the end result is worth ditching your political ideology whilst working towards an end which the "people" as a whole benefit. If there was a book entitled "common sense" then perhaps we could agree on so much more and stop this pitiful behaviour, like feral cats in a bag, fighting because, 'it's what's expected of us'.
Each line, each sentence is so pitched to elevate the argument that the other person is wrong and not just wrong but crazy to believe what they do. And yet we all come upon life and make of life what we can from so many different directions. There is no one truth only an embroidery of experiences and aspirations which make us all sublimely individual. How can a person write as if he/she represented us all in anything other than the most arcane issues of which we most likely haven't yet had the opportunity to consider. This need to collectivise us all, to homogenise us all and written by someone who has little understanding of himself/herself, let alone others.
The stick to beat the "Leavers" turns out to be immigration and the supposition that we are all racist.  They turn to using those words, which in our passive, sensitive, minority obsessed world close down further communication. Racist, misogynist, sexist, are but a few which the controllers of free speech use to cast blight on any alternative opinion.
And so people who voted "Leave" did so largely because they feared immigration and their fear was based on being racist. The argument that the politicians of all political persuasion had failed to consider the implication of inviting millions of people into our country without a thought to housing, schooling, integration and the effect on society of strong religious beliefs rooted in societies thousands of miles away with cultures far far different. A gamble was taken and is still being taken that the ordinary man and woman in the street will some how work it all out in a good natured way and that provision for such a dissimilar group need not be planned, is typical of the bumbling approach our political elite deal with genuine problems. Give it time and it will go away.
Immigration was not the most important thing on my or many other people's agenda.
My worry was that this Federalisation agenda, which is needed to make the EU work from a financial point of view, was not something I wanted to see.
I am anti Globalisation for the same reason, this incessant need for collectivisation, the creation of a sameness in a mould suitable for financial and market simplicity but in which we have seen the benefits fall to a few, leaving the majority on a social and emotional scrap heap.

What we now need is not analysis of 'why' but of the 'how and where we go from here.

The country needs to project itself that it's open for business. It's entrepreneurs and sales people should be out selling and finding out what the world markets need. We should begin again to be proactive not sitting in the middle of a cartel but closely attuned to the other 6 billion plus people who are not European. 

Leadership

Watching events unfurl after the referendum vote to leave the EU one is fascinated by the alignment of people wishing to throw their hat in the ring to become the next PM and more importantly to lead the negotiations for our exit.
One of the important questions is can someone 'who didn't want us to leave' be in charge of the specifics surrounding our exit. Can someone who's heart is not in the game be trusted to obtain maximum advantage of our position or will they always have, as an aside to the people on the other side of the table "don't blame me I voted to stay in" ?
Looking at the candidates from the leave camp I was not impressed by any of them until slowly to emerge as a bright sensible individual with a background in the one industry which we are good at and might pull us through, until we rediscover how to manufacture things again, is Andrea Leadsom

Listening to her this morning on the Andrew Marr Show she projected a "can do" attitude  which was refreshing. She didn't seem daunted by the task and wanted to invoke Article 50, the trigger to begin the negotiations, straight away. Her business acumen rather than a purely political background is what is needed as we launch United Kingdom PLC, not a political gavotte with the masters of the dance, the bureaucrats in the Commission but someone who  as the negotiations drag along, will at the same time put her effort into making us, as a country "fit for purpose" enacting decisions led more by the need for future investment and training than by the politics of attracting votes.

Theresa May although failing outside my initial criteria, having voted with the Stay camp has the gravitas and a cool head under pressure evidenced by her taking on the Police when faced with the need to cut their budget. She placed herself in the firing line at their conference and was unflinching in her decision to tackle the old shibboleths of John Peels force. She would make a good PM but this morning I have switched behind Leadsom if for no other reason than her breezy optimism which is what we need as a country.
Gove, I think unfairly, has been painted a traitor for telling the world what it needed to know, that the heir apparent Boris Johnson was not up to the task. He did us all a service, unless you are one who wish to see us relegated to a circus which is what the clown Boris would have projected. Gove also is a man of principle and his fight with the teachers union was no less a bloody affair than Mays battle with the police. Cameron didn't have the stomach for Groves questioning much of the entrenched practice within the teaching profession and moved him to Justice where he was engaged in a shakeup when the Referendum was called. He comes across as a geek swallowing his words and I feel the populous would never take him to their hearts as I think they will with Andrea Leadsom.

We are all in this together.

There will be a gradual decline in the value of the UK regarding its standing vis a vis other countries world wide which will be similarly reflected in a decline in the prosperity of the country.
These are the words of Philip Hammond this morning in a television interview but of course this has been the condition for large swathes of the population for over 6 years and further inflated since the cuts started by George Osborn in his effort to balance the national books. For many it was believed that the brunt of these  savings in the national interest were levied disproportionally on the poor whilst the rich successfully levied for   tax reductions and many companies who had, through clever accountancy, avoided paying tax at all and were handled with kid gloves by HMRC. 

It is well known that the Banks had been given a massive fillip by the Exchequer, through the Bank of England by propping up the banking sectors balance sheet using the nations tax receipts to infuse huge amounts of Capitol, not as a loan but as a method of writing off bad debts. This massive largesse direct from the pockets of the working man and woman was accepted, much as casualties are accepted in war time, but when the people saw the traders and CEOs, almost immediately resume, with their snouts firmly in the trough, illicit financial transactions as if nothing had happened but this time with "our" hard earned money, the scepticism began to grow that the system wasn't right. 

When the Management/shop floor differential in earnings went from 50 to 100 to 200 times the wages paid to the ordinary worker, people began to see what Globalised Neo-Liberal Capitalism actually meant, it was no wonder that the LEAVE campaign with its disregard for  the people who were warning of the dire consequences, (largely the money men) , if we left Europe were deliberately ignored. In their minds we were technically on the road to the poor house anyway and this way, we might take some of "them" with us.