What used to be said, disdainfully, of Leave voters – ‘They were duped…they didn’t know what they were voting for.. things have changed etc.’ – has been reduced to a single sneer over the past few weeks: “Fuck’em” (that’s a direct quote). But isn’t turning over the referendum going to destroy millions of people’s faith in democracy? “Fuck’em.” Isn’t stopping Brexit a gift for the far-right? “Fuck’em. They shouldn’t have voted Leave.” But aren’t these the people who are going to be most hurt by no-deal? “Fuck’em. Serves them right.” Every day for the past 1000 days, there are those who have woken up refusing to accept the result of…
-
-
The age of unreason
Jon Snow has “no recollection” of screaming ‘Fuck the Tories!’ at Glastonbury this year. Neither does he remember adding a cheeky, ‘I’m supposed to be neutral’ to a breathlessly happy fan, who then tweeted it (and then deleted it). Maybe he doesn’t, maybe he does. Self-evidently it’s the sort of thing he might have said, otherwise he would have issued something more substantial than a good old fashioned non-denial-denial. I’m guessing being either quoted or misquoted as saying “Fuck Jeremy Corbyn!”, for example, might have elicited a slightly more strenuous response. But here’s my point. Imagine, just imagine, what would have happened if Laura Kuenssburg or Nick Robinson had been…
-
Mourning isn’t enough
This comment piece appeared in the i newspaper in the wake of the Manchester attacks We should be angry about the Manchester attack How inevitable it is, that at times like this all the sordid clichés and false apprehensions come out. That if it weren’t for a “reckless foreign policy” the Salman Abedis of this world would wish only peace upon the West. That without an innately Islamophobic British population forcing disenfranchised young men into the arms of the radicalisers, the Salman Abedis would not exist. That love and unity alone will protect our children from people who see them as fair game for nail-bombs. ‘People like Salman Abedi don’t…
-
Welcome to the left
The thing about momentum, is that it has to be sustained. You can’t restart momentum; if something is slowing down it’s decelerating, with inertia the ultimate conclusion. The thing about Momentum, is that there’s absolutely no surprise it is decelerating. It was at best a bad idea, at worst a malevolent ploy, from the offing. There are those who say that Jeremy Corbyn’s doubters – yes, plotters before you scream it at me – had it in for him from day one. Well, they’re right, but I think they might have the wrong day in mind. From the day Momentum was set up, he lost all hope of ever winning…
-
Let’s drop the myth that Corbyn is the Messiah, then maybe we can make some progress
This article was posted on the Huffington Post in the week of Jeremy Corbyn’s re-election as Labour leader Let’s drop the myth that Corbyn is the Messiah, then maybe we can make some progress I take precisely zero pleasure in this. I’m actually quite depressed. If it weren’t for the private messages I receive on social media, or the frank conversations over a beer or two, with Corbynistas doubting their own Corbynianity (while still publicly whooping his name), I might not have the confidence to say all this. I’ve been to two Corbyn rallies now, with almost exactly a year in between, and the same thing has happened on both…
-
Hunt thinks junior doctors lack “professionalism…
…and a sense of vocation”? Is he kidding? If Jeremy Hunt isn’t trying to rile the medical profession, he’s got a funny way of going about it. With tensions high and strike action on the cards, saying that contract reforms, the very source of the strain, will bring back “professionalism and a sense of vocation” to a career that attracts some of the most talented and dedicated people around is either a whole new level of crass or it’s designed to inflame. And inflame it has: on Saturday the BMA’s Junior Doctor Committee voted to ballot its members over strike action (or some other form of protest), which could happen…
-
Addenbrooke’s hospital is just the canary in the coal mine as far as the NHS is concerned
First published in the New Statesman A toxic cocktail of under-pressure local authorities and low staffing has the NHS on the brink. By Benedict Cooper Among the grim litany of charges laid out in the Francis Report into the Mid Staffordshire scandal, time and again short staffing came up. “It should have been clear,” the report said, “from the history and the nature of the deficiencies being reported, particularly in relation to staffing, that a dangerous situation had been allowed by the Trust leadership to develop and that urgent action and intervention were required”. It went on: “The complaints heard at both the first inquiry and this one testified not…
-
Greece: a word from the wise
From Will Hutton’s Them and Us (2010); Chapter 6 ‘Blind Capital’ “The new credit default swap (CDS) was meant to insure the holder of a security against default, but in fact it did little more than provide the means to speculate on the price of bonds, rather as currency options could be used to speculate on currencies. Again, there was no insurable interest: the CDS was not an insurable premium but a gambling chip. Buy a CDS in a bank or country debt, and as soon as there was concern about the credit-worthiness of the loan the price of the CDS would rise. Hedge funds buying CDSs in incredible volume…
-
We tried
I won’t lie, I felt pretty abject on May 8th. So many hopes shattered, so many people now entering frightening unknowns, feeling insecure, threatened, battle-weary; so much disappointment, so many careers dashed and prospects ruined. This is the reality which a whole nation of healthcare workers woke up to the day after the election. Because we the Left could not persuade you the voting public what was at stake yesterday. I’m sorry. I’m sorry we could not speak over the volume of a right-wing press complicit in the dismantling of our greatest public service. We could not persuade the BBC to give you the facts, or ask the government the right questions…
