As I Please

We ended our previous blog with a comment somewhere between a threat and a promise.

We had hoped to get all our discontents off our chest but it was not to be. Sadly Holdenforth/aka John Holden, a grizzling, grousing, griping grumbling aged malcontent finds that he disagrees with almost everyone about almost everything and inevitably we have more to say.

Let’s get on with it.

Holdenforth has noted that recent media outputs have been replete with two categories of space fillers:

• Highlights of the year which is about to end.
• Prospects for the world in general and for the UK in particular for 2024

Holdenforth eschews both of these space fillers.

We all know what happened in 2023 and some of us have a rough idea why what happened did happen.

As for the prospects for 2024 – your guess is as good as theirs and, quite possibly, as good as that of Holdenforth.

Instead Holdenforth will jot down a few wry observations on what has happened together with what we would like to happen in the coming year in the forlorn hope that our modest suggestions will be added to what is referred to as the weight of public opinion.

Monarchical matters

Holdenforth has been dismayed as the PR machine at the disposal of the Monarchy has worked tirelessly and, it has to be conceded, highly effectively to restore the respectability of the institution. We had assumed in our naivety that the squalid conduct of Prince Charles and of his former mistress would present too formidable a series of obstacles to a restoration of the respectability that was such an enduring feature of the reign of his mother.

How wrong we were!

We were and we remain uneasy that the unorthodox route to the throne by Camilla was one of the more audacious usurping of the crown in our 1000 year turbulent history.

Yet again Holdenforth has to acknowledge the truism that the people have short memories.

In an earlier blog we asked about what, if anything, Princess Diana and Leon Trotsky had in common.

We thought that both of them had been airbrushed out of history by very effective manipulation of  PR machines by their respective detractors.

Holdenforth is unhappy about the way that Charles III increasingly appears to us to be angling for a degree of power and control over the affairs of his subjects similar to that exercised by his predecessor Charles I – prior to his losing the crown with his head still on it.

So – no squeamish abstentions for Holdenforth on this one -the actions and activities of Charles I and his consort have persuaded us to transfer to the Republican camp.

Gaza 

As I write possibly the most harrowing event now taking place anywhere in the world is the treatment by Israel of the 2 million inhabitants of Gaza, a tiny narrow strip of land – approximately 45 square kms to the south and west of Israel.

It is in this tiny area that Hamas operates and in which the October 7 attack was planned

In the 12 or so weeks that have elapsed since October 7 Israeli forces have inflicted huge casualties on the civilian population.

It is not easy to predict a civilised lasting settlement to this frightening conflict, the origins of which go back into the mists of time.

For our part we hope for the best but we fear the worst.

The Conflict in Ukraine

This conflict is now well into its third year and there are few signs that the war will end any time soon.

Holdenforth would like to rewind the tape of history back to the Crimean War waged between France and Britain on the one side and Russia on the other side in 1854.

“If there was a moral to be drawn from the Crimean War (1854 to 1856) it would be this: in a war between Russia and the West, it will be the Powers which keep out who will be the real gainers”

 “Crimea: the War that would not boil”

 From an essay by AJP Taylor.

Does the verdict of AJP Taylor on events which took place almost 200 years ago have any relevance today?

Holdenforth thinks that it does.

The Aged

 “And so, from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,

And then from hour to hour, we rot and rot:

And thereby hangs a tale”

From As You Like it   Shakespeare

Holdenforth is currently struggling to cope with the problems posed by acting as a carer on a 24/7 basis for two octogenarians – namely himself and his wife.  He himself is well past the watershed and into the rotting phase.

Holdenforth urges octogenarians faced with the prospect of this ordeal to take steps to opt out of the challenge posed by providing for care for themselves and their octogenarian spouse.

A closing thought on this topic. Holdenforth gathers that there are in our midst many thousands of old timers who – for a variety of reasons – are unable to access the required level of support from the caring sector.

We also gather that there are in our midst many thousands from the portly sector  who struggle to lose weight by time honoured means and resort to surgery to achieve  trimmer figures.

Holdenforth can confirm from personal experience that if those from the portly sector were to provide for the needs of  old timers in need of care  on a 24/7 basis the pounds surplus to requirements would be shed in a few weeks – a  win win outcome -and no pun intended for our editor.

The death throes of the Tory Party

We at Holdenforth find ourselves more and more baffled by the Whitehall farce known as the Rwanda plan. The basic facts of the farce have been documented at interminable length. The gist of the matter is that a wholly absurd plan to cope with the flow of illegal immigrants has been allowed to spiral out of political control by a politically bankrupt government.

In the unlikely event that Mr Sunak reads this blog he will parrot his automated response – “desist from your unpatriotic slogans and get behind your democratically elected government as we work to reduce the number of illegals by up to double figures within the next 5 years.”

The conventional Tory wisdom is that this respite will allow the Tories to win the coming election and provide a breathing space to come up with a Baldrick type plan.

Where does Holdenforth stand on the vexed question of illegal immigration?

Many of the asylum seekers and refugees are simply seeking to do what you and I would do were we in their shoes – to improve the conditions of their lives.

• It could be argued – indeed it is argued by some – that the criminal gangs arranging illegal entry in small boats are simply exploiting a clear gap in the travel market – to provide a travel service to those seeking a better life.
• The UK authorities encourage the growth of this market opportunity by making available to those who succeed in landing on our shores a significantly more agreeable life style.
• Most of the venom of those in the Tory party anxious to demonstrate that they have a workable plan to tackle the problem is directed against small boats with their cargo of illegals.
• As I write there are around 2 million Palestinian civilians in Gaza being bombed on a daily basis. Sooner or later someone will suggest that arrangements be made to allow these genuine asylum seekers and refugees to come to the UK possibly in very large boats – say a couple of Royal Caribbean Cruise liners with each with capacities of at least 5,000 thus getting around the ban on small boats – what happens then? Which of us would not gladly exchange life – and death – in Gaza for a new life in the UK?

Notes on the General Election which will take place in 2024

Much of the chatter in the various media channels has centred on the likely outcome of the 2024 General Election. For obvious reasons most forecasters have / are predicting a substantial victory for Kier Starmer and the Labour party .

Holdenforth would like to have its say.

Our focus will be on the Cameron factor and the Farage factor.

Permit us to rewind our tape back to the Tory / Liberal coalition which was in power from 2010 to 2015.

As the 2015 election loomed Cameron committed the Tory party to hold a referendum on our membership of the EU were his party to  win the election. The word was that Cameron made this policy decision to neutralise the growing threat posed to the Tory party by Farage.

• The good news for Cameron – he wins the 2015 election.
• The bad news for Cameron – he loses the referendum in 2016 and immediately resigns as Party Leader.
• The worse news for Cameron – he becomes mired in a series of scandals which seemed to Holdenforth to signify the end of his career in public life.
• The Lazarus factor – Cameron is chosen by the PM Mr Sunak to be simultaneously appointed as our new Foreign Secretary AND appointed to the House of Lords.

Holdenforth suspects that we were not the only ones to be startled by this turn of events. Doubtless many Tory MPs in the Commons and possibly some Tories in the House of Lords were less than ecstatic.

We have had our say at some length in previous blogs about the fact that the House of Lords and Democracy are mutually exclusive – or ought to be.  The Cameron factor emphasises the contempt shown by The Tory party in general and by Sunak and Cameron in particular for just about any model of democratic government.

Meanwhile, the Reform Party, the political wing of the anti small boats movement is said to be gathering momentum – momentum with a small M – and this development provides an incentive for Mr Sunak to call an early election.

Mr Farage and his Sancho Panza Richard Tice are timing their move to the front carefully.

We at Holdenforth are NOT admirers of Mr Farage but it would be absurd not to acknowledge that in the past decade Farage has played a major role in the political life of the UK. All the indications are that this will continue to be the case in the next few years.

In Conclusion

A few Holdenforth slogans from previous blogs- slogans that are dear to our hearts.

• We yearn for the privatisation of the BBC.
• We demand to know what is holding up the appearance in court of those responsible for the appalling miscarriage of justice in the persecution of sub postmasters
• When will HMG end the Chilcot factor and instead put a time limit on public enquiries?
• When will the issue of who can work from home and in what circumstances be decided by management?
• Let us widen this point – when will the management sector do its job – in particular to accept the responsibility that was formely thought to be the reason for substantial reward packages paid to those in the sector?

As I Please

A question for Holdenforth readers:

What does blogger Holdenforth, aka John Holden, have in common with Mr Dick , the eccentric companion of Betsy Trotwood , in “David Copperfield” by Charles Dickens?  There is a link – let me explain.

Holdenforth has noticed a tendency for hostile references to our newly crowned King Charles the Third, aka C3, to intrude almost unbidden into our blog.

This brought to mind the difficulty encountered  by Mr Dick in an earlier era. He was attempting to write a memorial about some eminent politician or other but for whatever reason the spirit of the beheaded Charles the First had taken up residence in his mind and hampered all his attempts to write his memorial.

Thus, Mr Dick and Charles 1: thus, your blogger and C3.

Just one other point before we get our show onto the road.

Whenever we read that so and so has been raucously proclaiming – usually to the assembled media that he/she has not been guilty of any wrongdoing we automatically put to one side our usual presumption of innocence and assume that there has been some sharp practice and that the raucous proclaimer has been “at it. ”

The House of Lords  v The People- the implications for democracy

Holdenforth noticed that the unelected members of the House of Lords took a dim view of the plans of H.M.G to despatch illegal immigrants to somewhere or other to await decisions on the right to come to the UK.

Today we look at this issue from just one angle – who do we support in this conflict between the elected House of Commons and the unelected House of Lords?

For us – this a no brainer. We at Holdenforth have long contended that the HoL should be abolished.              

What a farce. What an affront to the very roots of democracy.

This absurd antiquity resembles an old folks’ home on a busy day.

On a quiet day – it is like a morgue.

How on earth can the UK urge the adoption of democracy to Putin and Xi and other dictators.       

 The rise and rise of imploding political parties

An intriguing feature of the UK political scene in recent months has been the novel, entertaining but ultimately disconcerting tendency of major political parties to implode. We voters can only look on in amazement as organisations thought to be based on sound policies which have persuaded the electors to support them.

Examples include the most prominent in this category, the SNP and the Tory party.

Holdenforth can only speak for himself, but he was baffled when The SNP collapsed over the issue of gender. The SNP has had a long and plausible policy in seeking an independent Scotland.

I gathered that there had been some dubious accounting practices at the top of the party – but nothing new there in the politics of the UK.

That a major political movement should implode on a matter of utter irrelevance and triviality to most of us was and remains baffling.

“They hated capitalism, they hated imperialism, but most of all – they hated each other”

Alexie Sayle writing about his associates in the Trotskyite sector on Merseyside some 60 years ago.

It is not easy to specify what hatreds are shared by senior members of today’s Tory party – other than each other.

Hence the implosion in the Tory party.  That the party has imploded is irrefutable.

The Sunak government resembles a group of King Lears after Lear’s furious retreat in the storm and his assertion to no one in particular that “I will do such things – I know what they are but they shall be the terror of the earth.” 

This outcome is less surprising than that in the SNP if only because it was a predictable outcome of the Brexit campaign.

The task of the Labour Party in general and of Sir Keir Starmer in particular has been to sit back and observe the disintegration of their political opponents, not exactly a formidable challenge. 

The sudden emergence of the general preference expressed by the UK public  for our rivers and sea shores to be free of raw sewage.

Holdenforth has been startled, not so much by this wholly understandable preference, as by the effrontery of the spokespersons for the water companies.  The apologies have flowed over the airways as freely as our collective untreated excrement has been allowed to be discharged into our waters.

We ask to be spared these phoney apologies – they have been issued solely because those responsible have collectively broken the 11^th commandment – “thou shall not be found out.” 

The explanations for the wholly avoidable widespread pollution have been an unseemly combination of mendacity and greed on the part of those allegedly managing the water sector.

Holdenforth has much more plausible explanation for what has happened. In our book, A Cushy Number, written some 20 years ago we looked at the demands imposed on job holders and the rewards pocketed by the same people.

Sadly over this period the priority of many of the top managers in the privatised utilities has been to focus exclusively on maximising their rewards to the exclusion of everything and Holdenforth readily concedes that thieving can be very demanding.

Our suggested solution:

• Take this sector back into public ownership immediately, and;
• Prosecute quickly those senior officials responsible for these repeated breaches of their responsibilities.

A word about a development which rivals the anti-social behaviour of the water bosses in impudence, if not in gravity.

“Outcry as town hall boss says working 4-day week is a gift.”

Headline above a report in the Daily Mail concerning the decision taken by South Cambridgeshire District Council to increase council tax whilst giving staff an extra day off.

Holdenforth’s eyebrows edged upwards as we read this it.

What followed raised our eyebrows much further.

The paragraph read:

Council Leader Bridget Smith “faced questions after appearing to admit the four day working week experiment had been introduced for the benefit of its top official’s secret PhD project on the topic.” 

As we see it – a PhD project carried out at our expense –  several years writing propaganda for the privileged public sector. 

Matters arising from this project.

• Holdenforth is sceptical about the theme of the research project. We will go further and contend that the findings of the  project had been decided in advance.
• Why on earth did the employer not simply declare redundancies given the obvious over-manning identified?
• Holdenforth is not urging The South Cambridgeshire District  Council to establish a Stakhanovite regime to serve as a model for poorly performing town halls  – that would smack of bolshevism, a political view which is not exactly the flavour of the moment.

However, Holdenforth is unhappy about the propensity of those in senior positions in our Town Halls to do less and less work for higher and higher reward packages.

Why has this been allowed to happen?

Q- “Why does a dog lick its balls?

A- “Because it can”

Truism that Holdenforth picked up from the comedian Jasper Carrot.

Holdenforth believes that those running our Town Halls – Elected Representatives and Appointed managers – occupy similar positions in society to the nobility in pre-revolutionary France – and we all know the outcome to that conflict between the classes.

A pot pourri of grumbles from your  peevish petulant pensioner blogger – to be covered in future As I please columns

Putin v THE WEST

We are uneasy about the claim by that maestro of PR, Zelensky, that there will be peace on earth once Russia has been crushed. We are especially anxious about the pre-condition required to trigger this lofty goal – THE WEST to arm Ukraine to the teeth.

Nepotism

“One clear hallmark of a cushy number is a high degree of nepotism. We have only to look at the well known practice of people in the media and in politics to pass their cushy numbers on to the next generation. The Freuds, Dimblebys, Corens and Hoggarts come instantly to mind, and readers will doubtless have their own particular  bete noires in this category.  Such is my strength of feeling on this issue that I am willing to forgive Mr Rupert Murdoch his own ruthless nepotism on behalf of his own offspring because access to his Sky TV network means that I do not have to endure one or other of the appalling Dimbleby brothers when viewing post General Election inquests.

Extract from “A Cushy Number” by Holdenforth. 2003.

A wish to take a closer look at this issue was triggered by two recent news items.

Firstly, the addition of yet another Dimbleby to the already formidable list.

Secondly, a tsunami of adulation for recently departed Martin Amis from the Literati. 

Holdenforth hates to be a party-pooper but we diffidently refer our readers to a column by Bernard Levin – The Times, May 11, 1987. His  heme was that Mr Amis has recently become aware of the existence of nuclear weapons and of the consequences were they ever to be used.

“its vomit, vomit, vomit all summer long …. And not only the old heave -ho.  Like many another unilateralist Fat Boy he loves to dwell upon the very horrors that make him spew”