Dear James,
It was painful to watch. Yesterday Mr Alok Sharma and his supporting ‘expert of the day’, Dr Yvonne Doyle of Public Health England, fronted the daily Coronavirus Press Conference at Downing Street. These conferences are designed primarily to convince
Read MoreDear James,
We are living in historic times. Nothing quite like this has been experienced in recent generations and, rarely before, has such a natural disaster caused such chaos and disruption. The Coronavirus emergency has become the Great Disruptor amongst many smaller disruptors. But if there is one thing that this crisis is already teaching us, it is that everything is possible and that good can come out of bad as long as we all behave well.
Read MoreDear James,
At 8 o’clock last night, the sounds of clapping and the tinkling of bells rippled along our lane as residents came out from temporary self-isolation to applaud everyone who works in the NHS and the Emergency Services. These people – each and every one of them from the cleaners to the consultants - are putting their lives at risk for our own safety. We are all eternally grateful
Read MoreDear James,
Last night the message at last got through to us all. ‘Shut all doors! Stay home! Stay put!’ Thank you Boris, your message is finally, loud and clear even though, to deliver it, your minders had to put you in the straightjacket of a recorded address. I wonder how many takes it took to erase the smirk,
Read MoreDear James,
This morning the sun is rising over the Suffolk countryside, birds are singing and clouds of white blossom bloom against a clear blue sky. In front of my window, daffodils are nodding their glorious affirmations to anyone or no one, rabbits are high tailing it across the meadow and the tiny leaves of rose bushes are emerging unblemished into their early prime.
Read MoreDear James,
‘The lamps are going out all over Europe’? That is the phrase uttered by Sir Edward Grey on the eve of the First World War? What is its modern day equivalent? How about, ‘Doors, gates and borders are slamming shut across the world?’ It hasn’t got quite the same ring, but its message is the same. The world as we know it is closing down
Read MoreDear James,
When Harold Macmillan asked Rab Butler, his Home Secretary, what represented the greatest challenge for a statesman, Butler replied: 'Events, dear boy, events'. We are now in one of the biggest ‘events’ in recent history. The world is in chaos, the markets are in meltdown and governments everywhere are in confusion.
Read MoreDear James,
You certainly get around a lot. First it was PPS to Jeremy Hunt, then the same for Ben Wallis and then, yesterday, I caught a glimpse of you standing, a little sheepishly, at the end of the line outside No.11 as Mr Sunak held up his red despatch box prior to delivering his spend, spend, spend budget
Read MoreDear James,
Apparently back in the good old days -1998 to be precise – a man named Wolstenholme, called on the construction industry to use the Great Recession of that time as an opportunity to improve the image of its dismal performance. The phrase, ‘Never waste a good crisis’ has now entered the political lexicon. Boris has certainly been keen to put it to good use.
Read MoreDear James,
Today the government is sending out the cavalry. With tails up and pennants flying they will charge into the ‘enemy ranks’ in Brussels and strike fear into the hearts of the Americans in Washington. 100 British negotiators are heading to Brussels to begin the negotiations for a future trade deal with the EU. Almost simultaneously other negotiators, fronted by the plucky Liz Truss,
Read MoreDear James,
Do you ever get angry? You know, suddenly, violently, lose-it-all, red mist angry? Probably never that bad I guess? You seem to be a pretty balanced, middle of the road sort of guy who probably gets frustrated at times - you know, the kids, the missus, small problems at work. But rarely do you lose it all.
Read MoreDear James,
We hadn’t seen Boris for over a week. Rumour had it that, contrary to speculation that he was holed up with one of his paramours in yet another love triste, he was in fact at Chevening attempting to work out how to ‘change our country for ever’. Today however, he turned up at PMQs and ran straight back into reality
Read MoreDear James,
It was all so embarrassing. It started on Monday with the press invited in to meet the new cabinet. There they all were, the grinning boss with his beaming new wunderkind, Rishi Sunak, at his side and the rest of the merry crew in respectful obeisance around the table. ‘How many new hospitals are we going to build?’ asked the Prime Minister. ‘Forty!’
Read MoreDear James,
It looked like the perfect political assassination. No finger prints. No blood. Not even a weapon. By refusing to accede to Boris’s demand that he sack each and every member of his personal staff, Sajid Javid took the poisoned pill and committed political suicide. Quelle surprise! What a shock! Except of course
Read MoreDear James,
According to the FT, Donald Trump vented ‘apoplectic’ fury at Boris when the two leaders spoke last week about Huawei and the 5G issues. If that does not tell you about the new relationship, I don’t know what does. Would Donald do the same with Kim Jong Un
Read MoreDear James,
On Monday the black hand of Dominic Cummings was at work again in Whitehall. Full of the usual manufactured optimism and hand jerking calls to action, poor Boris was strutting his stuff at a Press Conference to set out the UK’s stance
Read MoreDear James,
They used to say that the USA and the UK were two nations divided by a common language. Today, rather than dividing us, that language is re-uniting us in a most unfortunate embrace. It is the embrace of a new nihilism. ‘Destruction must come before the Future can Begin’ and ‘Everything is permissible if it achieves that end’. Your party is part of this James, even if you are not aware of it.
Read MoreDear James,
So the big day has come. Brexit is done. In a few hours we shall all be ‘free’ from malign Europe! From every public building in Westminster the Union Jack is flapping splendidly, flying bravely, shouting out ’Floreat Britannia!’. Meanwhile Boris has…
Read MoreDear James,
An ugly new word has been forced into my vocabulary of late. ‘Relatable’ is a neologism, a verb made adjective by the distortion of a perfectly good infinitive. If someone is ‘relatable’ it means they share your view of life. 'He’s a good bloke'. 'He’s someone with whom you would share a pint'. The word came into my ken last week on a Channel 4 programme on ‘focus groups’,
Read MoreDear James,
You are probably too young to remember Billy Bunter but for those of us of a certain age, he was the public-schoolboy anti-hero of the black and white television age. Bunter was a ‘loser’, overweight, mischievous, devious and with a permanent grin on his greedy face, always ready to raid the ‘tuck shop’. I think his public school chums would have called him ‘a bounder’.
Read More
