23 November 2011

Diary of a Corbynista

EU Withdrawal Bill, Philip Hammond budget coming – no end to the excitement

15 November

So begins the 8 day marathon that is the EU Withdrawal Bill.  The Daily Telegraph has on its front page photos of 15 potential Tory rebels.

16 November

If you were the Housing Minister, what would be the obvious things to do to provide truly affordable housing?  Set up and run major housebuilding projects?  Provide finance to local authorities undertaking such initiatives?  Some way down the list might come “Reclassify housing associations as private companies.”  According to Sajid Javid who is the Communities Secretary, this will enable the Housing Associations to borrow more cheaply and therefore build more houses.   The reclassification, he says, is a rethink by the Office for National Statistics.  I suppose, as an up and coming minister you have to be seen to be doing something.

17 November

The Süddeutsche Zeitung organised an economic conference in Berlin and invited David Davis to speak.  I suppose it is legitimate for David Davis to express his views in public but what is his purpose in this case?  Is he seeking to shift the views of EU members?  If so, is this megaphone diplomacy yet again?  I think it is significant that a German interviewer received a round for applause for saying that the British government appeared to be in chaos.  His statements appeared so bland as to be meaningless and I cannot see any positive outcomes from such an event.

18 November

David Davis and Theresa May are getting round a few EU member states.  Some are calling it a charm offensive.  So there were carefully staged shots of Theresa sitting with Donald Tusk smiling nicely and an almost identical setting with Tusk replaced by the Taoiseach.  Both gentlemen subsequently made quite negative comments about perceived UK progress.  Most depressing was Laura Kuenssberg’s interview of David Davis, where the Brexit Secretary appeared hyperactive, talking over his interlocutor on several occasions.  What had been achieved?  Well, we had led on the issue of citizen’s rights, offering the right to vote, which the 27 were reluctant to agree to.  It was a triumph of bluster over substance.

19 November

90 MP’s have signed a letter to the Prime Minister and the Chancellor proposing the establishment of a cross-party convention on health and social care in order to provide a sustainable long term approach.  The BBC describes the Labour members involved as senior politicians but the people mentioned are only senior in that they used to be significant but are no longer.  The Tories on the list are also in the wilderness and there is the odd LibDem.  However well meant, the initiative will not rescue health and social care reform from the long grass.

20 November

While we tingle with excitement at the prospect of Hammond’s budget and worry ourselves about how Brexit will affect us, more important things are going on in Central Europe.  Around 20 years ago I was on a business trip to Germany and channel surfed to find something that wasn’t Bavarian pop music (a contradiction in terms) and there was this dowdy woman rattling on for hours at some conference or other.  I was entranced because she spoke the purest German with clear diction.  Now Angela Merkel’s reign is under threat because she cannot get the Bundestag arithmetic right.  She has no DUP to buy off.   How ironic that, on the way down, one of the greatest of democratic leaders might bump into Mugabe, one of the most brutal and kleptocratic of dictators.

21 November

The Cabinet met yesterday and apparently decided to offer Barnier more up-front money so that he will start taking about a post-Brexit trade deal.  What happened to the assertion from all sides in The Commons that we needed to go through our liabilities line by line and pay whatever is our legal obligation?  This latest initiative appears to be unvarnished horse trading.

A couple of days ago I received an email from Ken, a friend of 40 years’ standing.  There was a long “To” list and I recognised many mutual friends.  The jolly content comprised 8 anti-Muslim jokes and Ken clearly assumed that we were all of a mind on the subject.  I recalled an email exchange with much younger friends at the time of the referendum.  I had sought to explain some of the immigration issues from my leaver perspective.  They had me as a racist and we did not communicate for a year.   My wife tells me that people are putting up Christmas decorations early this year to take their minds off Brexit.  Pass the bunting would you?

 

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