A Prediction

 

The nurseryfication of culture

Nina Welsch has a fine Critic piece on what she calls the nurseryfication of culture.


The nurseryfication of culture

Alienation has encouraged the normalisation of childishness

An “educational” video released by the Manchester Museum went semi-viral recently. I’ll give you the highlights to get it over with it. In it, a young female employee introduces herself as “using they/them pronouns” (sigh) and that “today, we’re finding Pride in our collection” (sigh). Their focus is the museum’s collection of taxidermic birds from the Victorian era. The Victoria era, they explain, was run by “cis, white, straight men” (sigh) and that is why there are more male birds than female ones in the collection. The way the birds are positioned, with the handsome males standing over the more submissive-seeming, plain-plumaged females is indicative of these patriarchal norms (sigh). They then point out the way bird families are grouped together with their chicks and how this reflects the implicitly oppressive “nuclear family” (are you drinking yet?).

There’s too much wrong with it to highlight everything — from the cynical anthropomorphising of non-human animals to the fact that the “nuclear family” wasn’t really coined until the 1950s and in the USA, nothing to do with Victorian Britain. It is just one of countless examples of ideological dumbed-down, virtue-signalling historical revisionism that leaves us all culturally poorer.


The whole piece is well worth reading as another aspect of the wider infantilisation of adulthood, particularly this point in the final paragraph.


When nursery children adorn badges, it is a way of grounding themselves in their surroundings and place in it, making sense of their little story in a vast picture interweaving countless. With adults who work in the heritage sector who cover themselves in pins and badges, it seems to be the opposite — a way of standing out from the history, artefacts or knowledge their workplace is steeped in. At a push, I’d call it almost disrespectful. What is missing in the cultural soul of so many people that they can play a privileged part in maintaining the legacies of such valuable institutions and still feel the need to signal to all that enter: Look At Me?

Lavish

Clothes donations help Starmers ‘look their best’ for the UK – Lammy

Sir Keir Starmer and his wife Victoria accepted donations of clothing so they could “look their best” to represent the UK, David Lammy said.

The Foreign Secretary said other countries allowed lavish, taxpayer-funded budgets for clothing for their leaders.

The Prime Minister is alleged to have broken parliamentary rules by failing to declare donations of clothing for his wife within the designated time limit.

The gifts, from prominent Labour donor Lord Alli, were not initially declared in the register of MPs’ interests.

Good to see the gilded wardrobe hasn't fallen out of use. Is that David Lammy's job now, making lavish excuses for this kind of troughing? I though he was Foreign Secretary and apparently he did too. 

Oh well, lessons learned as they say.

This all-knowing entity

There are numerous things we could say about the digital world and one of them seems to be its impact on education. The internet doesn’t “know” everything, but apart from the intricacies of specialisms, it “knows” vastly more than any human could ever know. Including government ministers – well we already knew about that – but also teachers.

As we know, this all-knowing entity has entered the home via computers, phones and various “intelligent” devices. One effect of this is that children above a certain age must now be aware that their school teachers don’t know everything, not even about their own subject. We may assume this awareness is permanent.

It’s something I’ve noticed with our grandkids, this heightened awareness of both the adult world and adult limitations. We adults see much the same thing in those who would rule our lives – in a political sense they aren’t masters of their subject either. They aren’t even masters of themselves – not that they ever were.

As if the University of Life and the Universal Expert have both entered schools and as yet there seems to be no coherent response apart from trying to keep the lid on it. They have entered politics and the wider public arena too. Political elites are trying to keep the lid on that as well.

There is a genie out of the bottle aspect to the digital world. Not that this genie is likely to grant any wishes, but as with any technical advance, we can’t go back. Kings, queens, presidents, political elites and religious leaders have become fallible humans who only very rarely live up to their exalted authority.

It is not so much that the digital genie will tell us what we didn’t know about the world of elites. It is more a case of the genie being there in the public domain as an inhumanly knowledgeable authority. It has the potential to undermine elites because it offers a form of oversight available to all. Far from complete oversight, but it is there, available to all, available anywhere at any time.

The problem now is predicting any kind of digital future because this all-knowing entity is a product of both human ingenuity, human effort and human fallibility coupled with inhuman speed, extent and depth. It is also censored.

It’s a very odd genie indeed, but even the censored version is out of the bottle and an encouraging feature is that elites don’t know what to do about it. A discouraging feature is the number of voters who merely play with it.

We don't know what this strange genie will do, but the inept nature of Keir Starmer's government became obvious with remarkable speed. No long newspaper editorials, no tediously tame TV interviews, no months and years of political pontification about learning lessons, debating policies and doing more to win over voters. The digital genie was much quicker than all that - ruthlessly quick.

There are numerous similar examples of this strange genie at work. It kept a close eye on Joe Biden's decline, there was no chance of escaping that embarrassment apart from a willing ignorance. It is equally aware of Kamala Harris and her inadequacies, it knew pandemic lockdown was stupid, knows Ed Miliband is a buffoon and knows Net Zero won't work.

Of course there are deficiencies, too many people just play with it and in the end may well be satisfied with a heavily censored version. Yet it is also possible that the genie really is out of the bottle and elites will have to find better ways of adapting because... maybe because it is smarter than they are.  

Jet Ski Ed

Sir Ed Davey jet skis into ‘very excited’ Lib Dem conference

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey has said people are “absolutely ecstatic” as the party’s autumn conference began in Brighton on Saturday.

At its first conference since the party won 72 MPs in July’s general election, Sir Ed described the mood as “very excited”...

As the conference opened on Saturday lunch time, Sir Ed rode a jet ski in Brighton, before speaking to the press.

Sir Ed became known during the general election campaign for stunts, which included bungee jumping and paddleboarding.


One thing Ed and the Lib Dems have not been afraid to admit by their behaviour is that Disraeli's Great Game is indeed a game, a show not to be taken seriously. A way to hide how futile it all is, at least from those who don't look too closely.

Otherwise it's not easy to make sense of Ed and the Lib Dems, because in spite of their MP numbers, they aren't going to achieve anything worthwhile. They don't attract talent, don't appear to value talent and zooming around on a jet ski doesn't exhibit talent, not even the talent of a natural showman.

SAE

This morning, Mrs H and I were chatting about how easy it has become to find and book a holiday. Click, click, check the price and location, check the reviews, click, click goes the credit card and the job’s done.

We went on to chat about older forms of communication such as letters and sending off for holiday brochures with an SAE for the reply. Which reminded us of something else - who now knows what an SAE, a stamped addressed envelope was?

An "honest discussion"

Government 'will not carpet countryside with windfarms and pylons', new clean power chief promises

However, Chris Stark - the new head of Mission Control, the centre responsible for greening UK power by 2030 - pledged an "honest discussion" with the public about the new infrastructure communities will have to get used to in return for cleaner, more secure power.

An "honest discussion" with the public eh? That's new.

Group forms to fight 60km Derbyshire pylon plan

A campaign group has formed to oppose plans to run a 60km (37 mile) corridor of electricity pylons through Derbyshire.

Residents in Amber Valley say the National Grid’s plans will ruin their landscape by running power lines held aloft by 50m high pylons between substations in Chesterfield and Willington in South Derbyshire.

National Grid said existing power lines did not have capacity to cope with the increased power flows from offshore wind turbines.

The NHS - it really isn’t rocket science

Neil Record has a useful CAPX reminder of why Labour isn't going to fix the NHS.


At this rate, Labour will never fix the NHS

Lord Darzi’s report on the state of the NHS, released today, is damning. His review found that waiting times have worsened, very little progress has been made on early cancer diagnoses and the health service has been starved of capital investment.

For a while, it looked like Wes Streeting was the man to come in and fix this. To many, the Labour Health Secretary feels like a breath of fresh air in his observations on the NHS. He basically thinks it’s broken, and had said as much. Many, many people agree, and all of us wish it weren’t.


The whole piece is quite short, what it says is well known among those paying attention, but it is still worth reading as a reminder of the solution Labour cannot tolerate.


It is simple. At the moment, money comes into the NHS from the top. For it to perform better, much, much better, money has to come in at the bottom. No ‘privatisation’ is needed (although it might be welcome in some areas); no more money is needed (at least not at the moment); no new ‘targets’ are needed. No new layers; no new ‘Trusts’ or confederations. All that has to happen is the money comes in at the bottom.

What do I mean by this? It really isn’t rocket science. Where does the money come into Tesco? Or Amazon? Or Netflix? Or indeed, any one of the millions of companies worldwide, large and small, that do the best they can with the resources they have, and which have over the last few decades, indeed the last century, enormously improved our lives in every possible way.

Angela Rayner Breaks Silence

I've posted an Intel Lady parody of Angela Rayner before, but Ms Rayner is such a deserving target that I've posted another.

Dumbing down the weather

James Dent has an interesting TCW piece on weather, climate and the replacement of broad historical perspectives by what he calls 'Presentism'.


The dumbing down of the weather

FOR MANY years media presentations of weather conditions were summarised in a simple map, showing isobars and main weather fronts, accompanied by a concise description on a regional basis, with a forecast statement for the near future. This information was well understood by a range of people with a modicum of education in everyday life. Regular watching of TV and reading newspaper forecasts provided me with the ambition of pursuing a career where I was involved in meteorology. But some time ago both media and printed format presentations switched to using the now universal hieroglyphic weather symbols, which when scattered over a small-scale map can give only a vague impression of actual and forecast conditions.

The main driver for this change came after the serious flood events of 1998-2002 when the Government decided that there was a need to improve awareness. This has led to the present glut of forecast apps giving weather predictions for several days ahead, summarised into a single hieroglyph, which are widely regarded as being nothing more than guesses.


The whole piece is well worth reading, both for what Dent says about dumbing down weather forecasts, but also the more general trend of ignoring the complexities of the past in favour of a distorted but politically convenient present.


Within this time frame of the last 12,000 years, there have been numerous exceptional events. There is indisputable geological and geomorphological evidence of major sea-level changes, inundations and major changes to river courses. Because nature is non-stationary, such events have occurred in recent decades as well as in the far past. For instance the North Sea flooding of January 1953 was just one of a series of similar catastrophic events, such as the storm that brought about the near-destruction of Dunwich, Suffolk, in the 14th century. According to documentary evidence, there were several major floods throughout the Mediaeval period causing thousands of deaths in the Low Countries.

Ed sets his sights on doing even better

 

Sir Ed Davey rallies his Liberal Democrat army to 'finish the job' in crushing the Tory Party

Ahead of the Lib-Dem annual rally in Brighton, he set his sights on his party doing even better than its historic 72-seats General Election result in July when it tore into the previously Conservative “Blue Wall” in southern England...

“We made a massive demolition job on the Blue Wall,” Sir Ed told The Standard.

“But there is more to go.

Arctic to be ice free by 2014

Scary stuff, but fortunately we have Ed Miliband to sort out global climate change here in the UK. 

A placemaking solution

Sidmouth Rockfish one step closer with signing of toilet lease

East Devon District Council (EDDC) and Rockfish have signed a lease agreement for the public toilet site at Port Royal on Sidmouth seafront.

Planning Permission was granted in June this year for Rockfish to open a new restaurant on the site of the old Drill Hall and adjacent public toilets.

Cllr Paul Hayward, East Devon District Council’s deputy leader and portfolio holder for Economy and Assets, said: "I’m excited to see progress towards a new restaurant for Rockfish and welcome their investment in Sidmouth that will create local jobs. It will help to revitalise the east end of Sidmouth’s historic seafront esplanade providing a placemaking solution for this neglected area of the town.


It's a new one for me - a placemaking solution. Mrs H said she could imagine a councillor standing up to waffle about placemaking solutions. Maybe I should be positive and think of it as a postmaking solution for blogs.

Rachel could ask Ed where the electricity comes from

Amazon Web Services ‘to invest £8bn in UK over next five years’

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is to invest £8 billion over the next five years building, operating and maintaining data centres in the UK, the company has announced.

Tanuja Randery, AWS
Many of the world’s largest companies use AWS data centres, and in the UK includes Deliveroo, easyJet, EDF, Just Eat, Monzo, NatWest, Sainsbury’s and others, as well as government agencies, educational institutions and public sector firms.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “I am under no illusion to the scale of the challenge facing our economy, and I will be honest with the British people that change will not happen overnight.

Blimey

Disney’s secretive Club 33 – and a couple’s $400k battle to get back in

Scott and Diana Anderson, both 60, spent 30 years trying to get into the elite £33,000-a-year club, which allowed them to rub shoulders with VIP guests in wood-panelled lounges.

Since gaining access in 2012, the pair had forked out around $124,000 a year to visit the Disney theme parks in Anaheim, California, up to 80 times annually.

But the couple’s fairytale lifestyle was brought to an abrupt end after they were banned from the members’ club in 2017 amid claims Mr Anderson had been drunk in public.

Determined to appeal against the decision, Mrs Anderson said: “I’ll sell a kidney.”


Well there we are, another story where I'm at a loss for something to say. Although I do appear to come across an increasing number of tales about baffling behaviour, it's possibly worth adding that.

I wonder how much she expects to get for the kidney? Avoid eBay is the only advice I can think of.

Just stop doing stupid things

Andrew Lilico has a CAPX piece on the futility of tax rises to control UK government debt.


Borrowing is out of control – and tax rises are not the answer

• UK government debt, currently running at just under 100% of GDP, risks rising uncontrollably
• Even the UK's current tax plans may not be achievable – there's no room to raise them further
• If we just stop doing stupid things, there is scope for the UK to catch up on growth

Meanwhile -


Supporting the move to electric vehicles

In a pan-Defence collaboration, trials of hydrogen fuelled charging facilities to power the electric vehicle fleet have concluded.

This marks a significant step forward in the use of sustainable energy sources in Defence.

Generating enough electricity to power roughly 120,000 miles of travel, the trial provided learning on the use of hydrogen as a source of fuel in Defence’s future energy mix.

This green wheeze aims to generate hydrogen via electrolysis using electricity from wind and solar, then generate electricity from the hydrogen.

From 1972

 

Mad or Bad

Staying with the theme of a recent post, antiques dealers are an interesting lot. Years ago I’d often chat with Nic, an elderly bookseller from Nottingham who once gave me an unbound three volume set of Samuel Johnson’s dictionary from the 1820s. Published long after old Sam’s death of course, but his dictionary was reprinted and used for decades afterwards. When bound it was a handsome set.

A few decades ago, Mrs H and I were wandering around an antiques fair when we came across a dealer selling what looked like rather ordinary aneroid barometers. Antique, but not particularly old and still very common barometers supposedly acquired from stately homes such as Chatsworth. It seemed rather odd, but dealers can be a rum lot.

Later I had a chat with Nic at the same antiques fair when he suddenly asked me if I’d seen the barometer dealer. I said I had. “He’d mad you know,” Nic said, “quite mad. Says his barometers have come from stately homes – have you read the labels on them? He’s quite mad.”

Mad or bad, it’s often difficult to decide, but Nic preferred mad.

They’d make the banks blush

Martin Lewis launches attack on local councils: ‘Like loan sharks’

He also highlighted the fact that UK households can face a bill of around £1,600 for missing a £140 payment by three weeks.

The Money and Mental Health Policy Institute, a charity founded by Mr Lewis, said processes are driving unacceptable harms that disproportionately affect people with mental health problems.

Mr Lewis said: “Council tax collection practices are so aggressive they’d make the banks blush. The grotesque process couldn’t have been designed better to accelerate distress for people in council tax debt, especially those with mental health problems.

Presumably this is what 'levelling up" leads to - equality of outcome.  

Not an issue we've come across, but local councils seem to be very keen on sucking up the cash these days. Naturally they will blame central government for any negative effect on those who can't cope with council enthusiasm.

Kim's Forbidden Pants

Forbidden fashion: N. Korean youth punished for mimicking Kim Jong Un’s pants

Some people find it "very confusing" that "even following what the supreme leader does is a problem," a source told The Daily NK

As North Korean authorities intensify a crackdown on youth fashion, they’ve begun targeting young people who imitate Kim Jong Un’s clothing and hairstyle, particularly those who wear baggy pants similar to the leader’s. The unexpected crackdown, which began in early August in Chongjin, is being enforced by the Socialist Patriotic Youth League.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a source in North Hamgyong province told The Daily NK on Wednesday that North Korean youths call the baggy pants, which have far more legroom than other pants, “supreme leader pants.”


Meanwhile we await a crackdown on young people imitating Keir Starmer's hairstyle and suits, Angela Rayner's individualistic fashion sense and Pixie's surely-not-the-Home-Secretary look. 

The details are still unclear

Labour backs new 'respect orders' to fight anti-social behaviour - but isn't yet sure how they will work

Dame Diana Johnson admits many who suffer from anti-social behaviour are still being let down by police and councils.

Labour has defended the concept of new 'respect orders' for fighting anti-social behaviour - but admitted the details are still unclear.


respect
/rɪˈspɛkt/

1. a feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements.
"the director had a lot of respect for Douglas as an actor"

2. due regard for the feelings, wishes, or rights of others.
"young people's lack of respect for their parents"

It's a problem when politicians and political activists support their fantasies by meddling with the meaning of words. 'Respect' is just another example and not a new one. In activist parlance, 'respect' seems to be something imposed, either politically, legally or by coercion of some kind, essentially the unearned respect the powerless must show towards the powerful.

A futile word to have adopted in this case. Or maybe slightly chilling when we consider official reactions to recent disturbances. The details are still unclear.

The Threat of Degrowth

 

When things just work

Vague and speculative this one, but the other day Mrs H and I were chatting with relatives about how younger generations seem to assume that things will generally work out okay.

Cars just work, online orders arrive on time, if the younger generation forgets to buy food there is always the phone and a takeaway, or the supermarket will have something, illness is a nuisance which can usually be sorted and so on. Daily life is clearly not perfect, but in recent decades, aspects of it have become slick enough for a degree of confidence to become habitual.

It's not that younger generations are unaware of risks and the possibility of things going wrong, but they seem to be less aware of it than older generations. Perceptions have changed as technology knits things together in previously impossible ways. Raised expectations are bound to follow and may spread beyond the next online delivery.

WWII is history, many serious and fairly common diseases are less threatening, houses are warmer and drier, cars more reliable, communication far easier, computers handle the paperwork, goods and services are easily located online - from a broad brush perspective, much of our world just works.

This is not to say that we have freed ourselves from problems, difficulties, failures, emergencies and so on. Neither have we freed ourselves from the problems of excess, growing old, ennui or mental problems. It is more of a raised expectation that many things ought to work, usually do work and although failure has not been banished, remedies are more accessible. 

The recent low vote for Keir Starmer’s Labour party may be an example of a shift in general expectations. As we know, the party has a huge majority based on a lower total vote than Jeremy Corbyn achieved. This will be an outcome of various factors, but one of them may be a lower confidence that political promises are deliverable in any meaningful sense. The marked contrast between rhetoric and daily life has become impossible to miss. 

There is nothing specific to be grasped here, more of a general awareness that political rhetoric is clearly not one of those many aspects of daily life which just work, which deliver what they are supposed to deliver. Keir Starmer’s political hill may be a much steeper climb than he imagines.

He even thinks in clichés

NHS 'broken' says Starmer as report warns children's health facing deadly crisis

Sir Keir Starmer is blaming the Conservatives for a "broken NHS" and claims the Tories' NHS reforms are "unforgivable and "hopelessly misconceived".

The shocking findings on the deteriorating health of the nation's children are revealed in a study by leading cancer surgeon and former health minister Lord Darzi.

It is obvious enough that Labour's political policy is to blame the Tories for everything they know they can't improve. Not necessarily a smart policy because it restricts them to things they can't improve, but that's a vast political arena.

A blame the Tories strategy does have one big plus for Labour, as it allows the party to include climate change at some point. Eventually Ed Miliband may justify putting back the Net Zero 2030 target by claiming the Tories didn't do enough. Then Starmer will speak about "broken Net Zero".

And the decline continues.

Tomb

Diane Abbott says Jeremy Corbyn's idea of a hot date was a trip to see Karl Marx's tomb

 
Diane Abbott has revealed Jeremy Corbyn's idea of taking her on a hot date was a trip to see Karl Marx's tomb - as she tells all about their love affair...

But in her new autobiography the MP has derided the future Leader of the Opposition for his complete dearth of romance - which seems to have sent her spiraling into complete boredom.

The Mother of the House describes the young leftie as '99 per cent absorbed in party politics', with the only interesting thing she remembers the dull youth doing being growing vegetables in his garden.

I'm not sure what to say about that, so I'll finish there and carry on making the evening meal.

It's fish.

Savvy

Starmer to visit US for second time as prime minister - but will he meet Harris and Trump?

A meeting between Sir Keir and Mr Trump would be a significant moment which would be seen as diplomatically savvy, especially if a meeting with Ms Harris materialises.

Savvy in the sense that it keeps the focus on Starmer and away from the rabble, or the Cabinet as it is sometimes called. This focus on Starmer seems to be the main aim of Labour spin doctors at the moment, which is understandable. We are also informed that -

"They will also discuss opportunities to strengthen US-UK cooperation to secure supply chains and increase climate resilience."

Which isn't at all savvy, although it does keep the focus off Ed Miliband. Unless he's also included in the high-carbon jolly of course.

Can we put the glass on it, John?

Some decades ago, Mrs H and I were browsing round a small and rather uninteresting local antiques fair. A dealer was showing an old chamber pot to a potential customer who had presumably asked about a maker’s mark on the base.

It was possible to tell from a distance that the chamber pot wasn’t anything special. For obvious reasons they were churned out in huge numbers and tend to be a little – er – functional. Anyway, in a loud voice the dealer called out to her husband – “can we put the glass on it, John?”

She meant the magnifying glass of course, to examine the maker’s mark as if it might possibly be George Jones or Royal Doulton and not some second division pot works which is what it clearly was, even without looking at the mark.

Ever since, Mrs H and I have often responded to anything pretentious with – “can we put the glass on it John?”

One of those people

By natural temperament, brother, and by social position I’m one of those people who can do nothing sensible themselves, but can read sermons to other people.

Fyodor Dostoevsky - The Insulted and Injured (1861)

Green co-leader opens party conference with scathing attack on Labour U-turns

Green co-leader Adrian Ramsay has opened the party’s conference with an attack on the “lacklustre offers and U-turns” of Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party.

Kicking off the left-wing party’s campaign against Labour for next year’s local elections, Mr Ramsay painted the Greens as “an inspiring alternative to business as usual”.

Bankrupt

‘Authoritarian’ Green Party could go bankrupt for ‘discrimination’ against women

The Green Party's conference in Manchester began on Friday when protesters gathered outside to voice their anger at the Party's views on gender...

Protesters outside of the party’s Manchester conference today said the alleged “ongoing discrimination” may lead to court cases with the potential to bankrupt the Greens.


There is nothing wrong with bankrupting the Greens, the quicker the better, but the Green soul is solidly authoritarian. May as well accuse them of being obsessives or mad.

Police Officers Describe UFO Encounter (1967)

 

The hard sell

New wind projects a good first step for government - but big challenges remain

Securing more renewable generation is only part of the challenge - the variable nature of wind and solar means Britain needs the ability to store that excess power.

A puff piece for wind projects, but there is no need to read beyond the admission of intermittency and storage problems - it can't work as claimed and it won't. 

The nature of the problem is repeated further down, but the lethal nature of intermittency remains vague, which of course it has to - this is a puff piece. Something people need doesn't have to be sold this hard. Something they certainly don't need has to be sold good and hard. 

Really, the hard sell is the big clue.

I'm sorry the leeches didn't work...

GPs using AI to apologise to patients, investigation finds

British doctors are using AI to respond to patient complaints to make their job easier, according to a medical group.

A report by the Medical Defence Union (MDU), who offer doctors legal advice, warns 'some doctors are turning to artificial intelligence programs like ChatGPT to draft complaint responses for them'.

The body says doctors have been 'allured' by the opportunity to 'make everyday tasks easier'.


I'm sure Ed Miliband is looking at this wheeze as a way to send automated apologies to victims of Net Zero. This quote seems generally appropriate -

"Say what you have to say without apologizing, please," said Gwendolen, with the air she might have bestowed on a dog-stealer come to claim a reward for finding the dog he had stolen.

George Eliot – Daniel Deronda (1876)

Part Delivery

 

A low bridge in Derby, we know it well. 

A spokesperson for Ocado said: " We are aware of the incident and can confirm there were no injuries sustained to the driver or to other road users, which is always our first priority."

Sounds Ambitious

 

Sussex families urged to 'Give Up Clothes for Good'

They are being urged to donate any pre-loved quality fashion and homeware to TK Maxx’s Give Up Clothes for Good campaign, in support of Cancer Research UK for Children & Young People.

Give Up Clothes for Good sounds ambitious, even for climate zealots. Ed Miliband should jump in here and warn the people of Sussex about the hazards of winter naturism.

Over in Ireland

 

Two Lists

A tongue in cheek approach perhaps, but in a sense a continuation of the previous optimism post. There is an obvious retort to that one – how do we get there? Economically the UK is a first world country, so there are a number of national assets which should help us achieve our optimistic journey to 2034.

• First world roads
• First world education
• First world healthcare
• First world public transport
• First world culture
• First world energy policies

Unfortunately one or two of these assets are not as they should be. These are –

• First world roads
• First world education
• First world healthcare
• First world public transport
• First world culture
• First world energy policies

It seems almost ludicrously obvious that the political games we play won’t do. The House of Commons and the party system of political oversight don’t provide political oversight. Loons, charlatans and fools churning out laws we don’t need - this isn’t the way. 

And we know it.

We need much more direct, knowledgeable and experienced political oversight of the major government ministries where we vote for specific pragmatic oversight of their activities. Their internal policies need to be transparent and subject to that same oversight. 

Currently this doesn’t happen, our creaking, outdated, foolish party system doesn’t deliver it. We need reform but not necessarily Reform.

Stupor

Tom Ough & Calum Drysdale have a welcome dose of optimism in CAPX.


Embrace Anglofuturism: we can jolt Britain out of its stupor

It’s September 2034. You are gently awoken by the light streaming in through your sash windows, which were recently made legal again. Leaving your Georgian mansion block, you pluck an apple off a heaving bough, and you make a breakfast of it. Today you will be jetting off from the super-spaceport in Avalon, which is the name of the Wales-sized artificial island in the North Sea. To get there, you step aboard a gleaming HS24 train that whisks you past soaring urban skylines. Nobody is playing TikTok videos in the quiet carriage.

You spend an enjoyable day overseeing AI-enhanced chemical engineering in the microgravity of HMSS Beagle, Britain’s rotating, drum-shaped space station. Then it’s back home for lab-grown toad-in-the-hole, which you share with your children, whom you can afford, and your parents, who are long-lived and able-bodied. Another glorious day of Anglofuturism.

In reality, of course, the Britain of 2034 will house you in an ugly little flat, miles from anywhere, if you’re lucky. It will not enable you to work in biotech, because the industry isn’t allowed to build lab space. You won’t have kids, because you can’t afford them, and your parents will be decrepit, because the NHS is unfit for purpose. Everything in supermarkets will be behind locked cupboard doors, and train carriages will be overrun by anti-social oafs. In short, the Britain of 2034 is not likely to be much different from the Britain of 2024.

The whole piece is well worth reading as a reminder that although we recently voted Stupor, 2034 doesn't have to be a version of 2024. 

And it's a fine evening.

It's that brick wall again

Car makers build green vehicles 'no one wants' to meet eco targets, says dealership chain boss

Car makers are being forced to build vehicles drivers 'don't want' to meet green targets, one of the country's biggest dealership chains has warned.

Under rules brought in by the previous Tory administration, 22 per cent of new cars sold next year must be zero emission. This threshold is set to rise to 80 per cent in 2030.

Robert Forrester, chief executive of Vertu Motors, said this meant car makers were producing vehicles that many drivers do not want.


It is remarkable how slowly the obvious can take to becomes obvious. Mr Forrester will have known about the problem for ages, but apparently the brick wall has to be really close to rouse our political elites, possibly not even then.

At this rate we'll hit it the wall and this does seem to be the current intention. Stupidly destructive, but so far there are no strong reasons to think otherwise.

Touts

Lisa Nandy hits out at ‘incredibly depressing’ Oasis ticket sale and orders probe into surge pricing

Lisa Nandy has called the inflated selling of Oasis tickets “incredibly depressing” and revealed that surge pricing will be included in a government review of the ticket resale market.

Before Oasis fans were hit with ticket prices more than doubling from £148 to £355 on Ticketmaster, the government had pledged to “bring in protections to stop people being ripped off by touts”.


As far as I can tell, Ms Nandy excludes the government from touting accusations, yet she could speak to Ed Miliband about the wider, but related issue of electricity prices. 

The BBC TV licence is another related issue. She could have some strong words with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport about that. Someone called Lisa Nandy apparently.

These issues are incredibly depressing.

Fudge Incoming

One-word Ofsted judgments for schools to be scrapped immediately by Government

Previously, Ofsted awarded one of four headline grades to schools it inspects: outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate.

Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson

“Single-word headline judgments are dangerous and reductive. They are unpopular with parents and teachers, and their simplistic impact has made the daily job of improving school standards harder for everyone except the bureaucrats.

Dangerous and reductive eh? That's a good summary of politics, so a C for Ms Phillipson. Although she remembered the phrase, she has applied it to the wrong activity.

Presumably she doesn't expect to see much improvement over the next few years, so getting the fudge in early could be an astute move. Or is that a dangerous and reductive conclusion? Probably not.  

Let's hope it stays that way

Tory leadership: We won't win back trust 'by pointing out how terrible Labour are', says Badenoch

Kemi Badenoch will lash out at Labour in a speech to launch her leadership bid - but she will say her party ultimately needs to "focus on renewal" rather than criticising the government to win the next election...

"If the Conservatives want to become worthy of the British people's trust again, we can't just sit around pointing out how terrible Labour are... fun as it is," Ms Badenoch will say.

It's fun now - let's hope it stays that way.

Another plagiarism scandal

Another academic plagiarism scandal which also raises a question about the level of plagiarism within what we might call woke academia. The point made here is that there is little to say in such fields anyway, so plagiarism is inevitable. 

A sarcastic take on it, but not entirely. What are woke academics supposed to do apart from quoting each other?

 

Rising Damp

For those who remember it, a reminder that the the ITV sitcom Rising Damp could not be made today. Not so much would not be made, but could not be made. An interesting piece because it doesn't really answer the question of why the sitcom couldn't be made today. Maybe it's all a case of TTIT - Two Tier Identity Tolerance. 

‘Rising Damp was sitcom gold – it could never be made today’

It is 50 years since the transmission of the first episode of Rising Damp, the ITV sitcom featuring Leonard Rossiter as Rigsby, live-in landlord of what used to be called “rooms”. Fifty years since the first appearance of the frayed grey cardigan, the tightly shut little purse, the decrepit cat, the hands on the lower back, head thrown back, eyes rolling with an exclamation of “Myyyyy God”.

It didn’t take long after that first appearance for Rising Damp to become one of the very few ITV sitcoms to enjoy both public popularity and critical approval, and for Rossiter to transition from noted character actor to star. Rigsby was a unique and somewhat difficult character – so was Rossiter...

It’s hard to picture an actor like Rossiter thriving today. How the hell could someone so spiky exist in a world of employment tribunals, HR concerns and complaints to Equity?

Likewise Rigsby in the modern world, 50 years on, would be a bad fit, though an entertaining one. The youthfully randy foibles of Alan and Philip, and the simmering sexuality of Miss Jones, would now seem positively healthy. Imagine Rigsby encountering pronouns or working-from-home or ADHD. One feels the head tilting back, the hands sliding towards the lower back, the eyes beginning to roll. Myyyyyy God.

Bean-counting smallness

Chancellor makes 'mistake' with Winter Fuel Payment - but she has chance to make corrections

Rachel Reeves has announced plans to means test the Winter Fuel Payment for pensioners - but with many elderly people set to miss out while still on lower incomes, it could cause headaches for the government when MPs return to parliament...

Impetuosity and inexperience lie behind the troublesome winter fuel announcement - for which no properly argued explanation, beyond regret, was offered.

Reeves appeared to have caved meekly to the Treasury's traditional bean-counting smallness, which often looks better on the spreadsheet than in the real world.


It looks more like a stitch-up rather than something which looks better on the spreadsheet than the real world. It won't have looked good on a spreadsheet, as the money saved is insignificant. As this piece points out, it may end up costing money if significantly more pensioners take up pension credit.

Not that the bean-counting smallness isn't there, but this debacle looks far more like a deliberate reminder of who manages these things, a reminder that it isn't Rachel Reeves and Keir Starmer.

It wasn't impetuosity and inexperience by Reeves and Starmer either, it was gullibility. Or maybe it was innumeracy. The numbers were bound to have shouted a clear political warning - "don't do it, it isn't worth it - sack those who suggested it."