Part one: Si no vuelves … (If you don’t come back …) An account of our recent trip to Spain in times of Covid-19, and our first post Brexit A few weeks ago, half way across the Bay of Biscay on Brittany Ferries’ Pont Aven, returning from a long visit to Spain, I listened to […]
The TV pictures from Kabul last weekend were apocalyptic: thousands of desperate Afghans converging on the airport, families and a handful of belongings crammed into their cars. Already refugees in the face of the breaking wave of Taliban at the city’s gates, many of them chose to spend the night parked up around the airport […]
Dear Editor, Re: Let’s not mince words: the mass murder in Plymouth was an act of terrorism I worry society is becoming too quick to judge and that we are too easily convinced we are right on every issue (having tapped into the opinions of people ‘like us’ on social media). During the Brexit campaign […]
Gleichschaltung is one of history’s most sinister euphemisms. The word is German and it means ‘co-ordination’. Hitler and other architects of the Third Reich used it to build a totalitarian state that purged Germany of all opposition. From 1933 onwards, das Volk, the people, were urged to march in perfect formation towards a future that […]
For the purpose of this article, let us accept that the Conservatives are in power and were in power when some of the events referred to occurred. Readers may say “But what if it had been Corbyn or Starmer?”. Please set that alternative scenario to one side. I am looking at what was genuinely a […]
Our eye was caught by this thread on Twitter which we are reproducing with the author’s kind permission. It prompted some further research into costs and an interview with a carpenter with a business in renovation and conversion projects in Devon. More from him below. Conversation with the dads at my son’s footie training yesterday […]
Conflict is at the core of the UK’s historical development, and bad government is nothing new. Throughout the nation’s history the same perennial bones of contention keep recurring, and successive Westminster governments have failed to settle them. This is demonstrated once again by the way the continually unfolding Brexit fiasco has reopened old wounds. I […]
Keeping track of this lot eroding democracy and accountability This is quite some list. An aide-memoire to the horrors already well on their way to implementation. Plans to constrain the Electoral Commission: Voter suppression via Voter ID Gerrymandering the borders to get TEN extra Tory seats Police Bill to ban peaceful protest Changing Mayor voting […]
This article, on the repeal of the Fixed Term Parliaments Act (FTPA), raises a question that needs more public discussion: who wields the historic powers of the Crown once the monarchy is no longer politically active? Should there be any limit on their use by a prime minister? Some of the highest powers of the […]
It was claimed in the Guardian yesterday that Rishi Sunak had written to the prime minister to ask for a relaxation in Covid travel regulations. He had. The populist in No 11 was trying to out-popularise the populist in No 10. You could not make up the scale of Covid recklessness on display when debate should be […]
Of course, our PM, who obviously prides himself in ignoring virtually all the norms of respectful, moral citizens, would regard the above as being nothing to do with him. With three marriages, multiple both publicised and, I would expect, hidden affairs, as well as an unknown number of children he confirms the first part but […]
“We bought an electric car thinking we were doing the right thing… but it’s cost us a lot to set the whole thing up.” So said my friend Trisha, after she read my “Net zero” article in West Country Voices and thought our readers might be interested in her experience of buying her first electric […]
Early in 2016 Boris Johnson wrote two reasoned articles on Brexit, one for and the other against, but only offered up the one for publication. He wrote the two articles to determine which campaign would give him the best chance of getting into Number 10. One has to give him credit for taking a reasoned […]
How is it possible that thousands of people in our country are persuaded to assemble in Trafalgar Square to applaud anti-vax cranks and far-right extremists such as Piers Corbyn and Katie Hopkins? What kind of delusional mania brings people to cheer the malignant, attention-seeking narcissist Kate Shemirani as she calls for doctors and nurses to […]
It’s the classic logic riddle: You are at a fork in a road on the border of two lands. Two guides stand guard at the fork; one always tells the truth, the other always lies. They know that one way leads to a land of comfort and safety, the other to danger and death. You […]
Meet Maia: 19 years old, resident of Orkney. Describes herself as “very politically aware”. We’d agree. Mike Galsworthy first drew our attention to her wise insights into the dirty tactics being exploited by Johnson and his gang. She has made an exclusive follow up video for us…hopefully the first of many! She’s amazed, dismayed, frustrated […]
The debate about ‘levelling up’ prompts this summary of the Johnson government. The Johnson government excels at ‘sloganeering populism’: ‘Get Brexit Done’, ‘Global Britain’, ‘Freedom Day’… and now ‘Levelling up’. The rhetoric projects energy and is meant to show a governmentt devoted to ‘the people’s priorities’. Behind the rhetoric, one might hope for some substance, […]
The government gave some staff in the NHS a pay rise yesterday, and then said that the cost must come out of existing NHS budgets. It refused a pay rise to the police. It’s as if they’re saying there is a shortage of money. There isn’t. A thread’s needed to explain that….. Once upon a […]
West Country Voices (WCB) launched a year ago with the help and support of Louise Houghton at Yorkshire Bylines, Mike Galsworthy and Tom Brufatto at March for Change and the blessing of Peter Jukes and Simon Colegrave at Byline Times. Run by a team of volunteer, citizen journalists, editors, proof readers and a picture editor […]
I’m going to repeat the boiled frog analogy (in which no frogs will be harmed…unlike us and our democracy). The unfortunate creature (metaphorically-speaking) is in a pan of cold water which is slowly, slowly being heated up. The frog adjusts his tolerance levels as the water changes from a pleasant coolness to a mildly uncomfortable […]
“The standard of leader in this country has been awful these last two years, but that man (Southgate) is respectful, humble, tells the truth – everything a leader should be.” Gary Neville’s words at the end of the England v Denmark match should ring in the ears of all those who continue to support our […]
Our prime minister is a national embarrassment – on a daily basis – but, today, he has surpassed himself. He is at Chequers for meetings with Angela Merkel and he is so convinced by his own Brexit myth-making, so sure that he can make lies truth just by repeating them, so ideologically-embedded in his Brexit […]
We have written three articles (see below)focused on the plight of millions unable to claim any support from the government through no fault of their own and whose pleas to Sunak have been ignored. Now, yet another person has been driven to take their lives. For this fourth piece, we defer to one of the […]
If further proof was needed that this administration is more concerned to play politics than to govern the country well, the recent report of the Education Select Committee provides it. The committee chose to tackle an important and urgent issue – the failure of our education system adequately to prepare large numbers of young people […]
Join us on 13 July at 18:30 when we will be discussing ‘The Little Black Book of Data and Democracy’ with its author, Kyle Taylor. The event is free and whilst it would be best if you had read the short book before, it’s not a prerequisite. You’ll almost certainly want to read it afterwards! […]
Blessed are the cheesemakers, for they will inherit Liz Truss’s vision of the earth. Trade secretary Liz Truss is famous for her obsession with cheese. Unfortunately this zeal does not translate into recognition of the damage done to the UK’s cheese businesses by Brexit. Instead, it manifests itself in maniacal enthusiasm for miniscule trade deals […]
Iain Duncan-Smith and TIGRR come up with some ludicrous and dangerous Tiggerish enthisiasms. Cynicism and vigilance required.
In our last conversation, we spoke with Philip Colfox of the Symondsbury Estate, an enterprise on the edge of Bridport in Dorset which combines farming, leisure and retail. Philip wrote to us afterwards with some ideas for a radical shake up in the UK’s food production. Here are his thoughts:
