The news agenda has accelerated to fever pitch over the last fortnight, journalists and commentators falling over each other to opine on the latest Trump antics, the local election results, the royals and much else, all adding to pressure on our mental wellbeing. Although the two major parties have long needed a wake-up call, the massive gains made by Reform UK in the local elections have caused a big shock all round – this organization now has to be taken seriously. Despite its simplistic sloganising and casual racism, too many have been seduced by its cunning narrative of offering change: what these voters don’t get is that a proper political party must have policies which stand up to scrutiny. It was depressing yet predictable that pollsters conducting focus groups with voters often encountered the attitude that being dissatisfied with the main political parties, it was time to ‘give the others a chance’, ‘let’s roll the dice’ etc. This is hardly an evidence-based, intelligent or nuanced approach to casting a vote. Political ignorance is very much in the frame here, and while voters need to understand politics much better they can’t totally be blamed because there’s no routine education in schools and it’s hard to escape the power of the right wing media.
Reform councillors also badly need some understanding of local government and its responsibilities, which so far has been visibly lacking. But politicians and commentators can no longer laugh off Nigel Farage or his party as some did previously. The Conservatives lost a whopping 635 seats, 45% of these going to Reform, and they lost control of 15 previously controlled councils. These losses make Kemi Badenoch’s arrogant verbal gymnastics during media interviews look even more hopelessly out of touch and this leader herself seem even further out of her depth than she already was.
Although the Tories cannot realistically change their leader yet again, there have long been mutterings of dissatisfaction with her performance and although taking some time after the general election to reflect and regroup was understandable, it’s not good enough that she’s still unable to present and discuss Conservative policy six months into the role. It would be illuminating to be a fly on the wall this week when she receives the call from the just-defeated leader of North Northamptonshire Council, clearly aggrieved and wanting her resignation. Jason Smithers told the BBC: ‘I am on a call next week with the leader of the Conservative Party and I will be putting it to her that she should be resigning. She has not helped in these elections; she has not once come forward and helped at all. I am in absolute fear the Conservative Party will implode unless we get a good Conservative who can rally the troops and bring us back to some type of party that is going to challenge’. Although this ‘fear’ is one many of us would like to see realised, you almost have to feel sorry for him because we’re told that ‘Northamptonshire has been seen as the beating heart of the Conservative Party for years – it held most of the county’s Westminster seats until last year and dominated the local councils’.
But when you hear people like Smithers and MP Richard Fuller (Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, who’s been on the media round) you realise that they still just don’t get why so many have voted with their feet against the Tories, starting with last July. The talk of promoting ‘Conservative values’ (which are only ever defined in vague terms) and ‘rebuilding trust’ is vacuous when it’s likely that any trust put in them in the first place was shot to hell through their own lazy, corrupt and dishonest self-harm over years. This Conservative Party death knell was sounded again by former Tory Cabinet member Justine Greening on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, who pronounced that ‘the party has reached a literal dead end’. Criticising Badenoch’s cliché-ridden interview performance, an X user asked: ‘What ‘difficult decisions’ has Kemi made? For how much longer can she cruise along minus policies? Her party will also still be suffering from the expulsion of Remainers so now it’s barrel scraping all the way. ‘I’m leading from the front’?? No way’. No susprise then, to learn that Tory MPs are meeting this week to discuss how to offload her, one saying ‘We cannot continue as we are – she’s just not up to the task’.
What’s clearer now, however, is that Labour has perhaps almost as much to fear from Reform as the Conservatives because Farage and his crew are also targeting their traditional base of working class voters. A worrying statistic in all this has been the low turnout, especially amongst Labour voters, as low as 30% in some areas. An X user tweeted: ‘Immigration is not even in the top 5. The problem is Labour progressive voters stayed home, felt betrayed by Labour. Labour needs to go back to their grass roots agenda, start making old, poor and working people better off, or we will be in Nazi hands in 4 years’. Although it’s recognized (not publicly in Reform or Tory circles) that change and improvement take time, many have become disillusioned with the party for not making change sufficiently apparent, for the disability benefits and Winter Fuel Allowance policies, and for the ongoing support of Israel given the terrible situation in Gaza.
Many have complained about the media, especially the BBC, constantly platforming Farage and talking up the Reform results: we have to wonder how they would have fared without this coverage. Nevertheless, perhaps it’s been useful that the terrible victory speech of Lincolnshire Mayor Andrea Jenkyns was reported so widely, as there’s no getting away from the downright nastiness of this big Reform figure’s bigotry. Having waxed lyrical about restoring this country to its glorious past (the irony that someone like her would have never achieved such a prestigious position back then was lost on her) she moved onto saying migrants should be put in tents and that savings should be made by cutting council workforces by up to 10%. It’s as if she doesn’t know that councils have experienced massive cuts over the last 14 years and are already pared to the bone, but of course nothing is allowed to get in the way of the wasteful councils narrative. She told LBC: ‘We’ve got to have a lean, mean local government’. What irony – ‘mean’ it certainly would be. Her response to news that on learning of Reform taking ten councils Unison immediately reiterated its determination to protect workers’ rights was to declare that she’s ‘up for a fight’ with the unions. This is typical of the aggressive and substance-free Reform schtick, her spiel being described by journalist John Harries as ‘the most graceless clunky acceptance speech’ he’d ever heard.
Whereas some social media users cheered Reform UK on, seemingly finding the idea of Farage making PM in 2029 quite realistic, others didn’t hold back. An X user asked’ So, if this man was to become the next Prime Minister, what level of work ethic would he adopt? Or is doing feck all for your constituents part of the job specification?’ Others have demonstrated scepticism of all politicians: ‘We get it is clearly the political buzz word at the moment like the politicians think that when they say it we all think and believe that “they get it” when they really don’t get it, they are in fact a million miles away from getting it!’ There’s no doubt there’s been a massive upheaval of the political landscape here and in the US but at least it’s good news that both Canada and Australia have responded to the Trump regime by standing up to him and electing left of centre candidates.
On Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg journalist Tina Brown alluded to him as the ‘King of Chaos’: too true and very unsettling as his policies don’t only affect the US, of course, their ripples will be felt the world over. He’s been criticized for his aggressive deportation policy on immigration, for discord within the White House team, for his moves towards dictatorship and his empty promises to immediately end the Gaza and Ukraine conflicts. Reality has shown itself to be not so easily manipulated by his demands and bully tactics. His latest stunt is a threat to impose 100% tariffs on films made outside the US (‘movies produced in foreign lands’) and there are fears that this could wipe out the UK film industry. Once again Trump resorts to his paranoid victim card playing narrative: ‘Hollywood is being destroyed. Other nations have stolen our movie industry’.
Numerous column inches and much broadcasting time continues to be devoted to Donald Trump and his almost unbelievable antics (how the orange narcissist must love this) and first 100 days but despite the extreme misplaced loyalty of the sycophants around him it’s pretty clear his honeymoon period is over. ‘Trump feels tug of political gravity as economy falters and polls plunge’ screeched one headline. He’s displayed economic illiteracy and political immaturity with both his tariffs strategy and approach to Ukraine and opinion polls tell of ‘a president whose unpopularity is historic’. MAGA cultists must get to hear some of this but perhaps continue to stick their fingers in their ears as Trump made outrageous statements for the most successful presidency ever and similar hyperbolic claims. ‘A majority of Americans regard him as both a failure and a would-be dictator. From the courts to the streets, from law offices to college campuses, revolt is swelling. Republicans are eyeing next year’s midterm elections with nervousness… 2 April, which Trump dubbed “liberation day” as he announced sweeping global tariffs, may also come to be seen as overreach day. His haphazard trade war rattled allies and wiped trillions of dollars off the stock market. Only fears of a bond market catastrophe spooked him into hitting the pause button. But he left in place tariffs on China as high as 145% and Beijing has refused to blink’. About half of his executive orders have been partially or wholly blocked by the courts, his approval rate amongst Americans is now down to 39% and his ‘people’ can only do so much to shield him from the massive anti-Trump demonstrations taking place there.
Surely, though, if anyone had previously wavered regarding Trump’s mental stability this would have ceased on seeing not only his vulgar conduct at the Pope’s funeral but also his AI generated social media post of himself in papal garb. There was widespread condemnation of this extremely tasteless intervention, especially from Catholics (with the notable exception of J D Vance, himself Catholic) but the White House continued in sycophantic and denial mode by rejecting any suggestion that the President was making fun of the papacy. This is after Trump had joked to reporters ‘I’d like to be Pope’.
Regarding the 100 days marking (we can’t call it a celebration) journalist Jonathan Freedland suggests that Trump is demonstrating he can rage but can’t govern. ‘He says it’s the “best 100-day start of any president in history’… In truth, the first three months of Donald Trump’s second presidency have been calamitous on almost every measure. The single biggest achievement of those 100 days has been to serve as a warning of the perils of nationalist populism, which is effective in winning votes but disastrous when translated into reality…. Perhaps most significant is that Trump is weak even in those areas where he’s meant to be strong. Confidence in his ability to handle immigration has tumbled and the same is true, even more critically, of his management of the US economy’. How ironic that as the stock market plunges he posts ‘BE PATIENT!!!’ when he has hardly demonstrated patience in any area, especially conflict negotiation, and when economists across the board display contempt for his tariffs policy. If Trump is this bad now, what will he be like during the next 100 days? Time will tell but it doesn’t look good.
Back here the interview given to the BBC by Prince Harry following the latest judgement on his personal security challenge has had mixed reactions, some apparently furious that the Prince alluded to the King’s illness but many expressing support for Harry, suggesting that others less deserving (like some previous prime ministers) had 24/7 protection as a matter of course and agreeing with the Prince (and a former senior protection officer) that it had indeed been ‘an Establishment stitch up’. Harry and his supporters say that undue royal influence had come into play regarding the decision of the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (known as Ravec) and that the King could step in if he had wished to. What has been nothing short of extraordinary is the suggestion that not only had King Charles influenced this decision in order to punish his son but also that he had actively signalled to other governments not to offer protection.
Harry said: ‘Whether I have an official role or not is irrelevant to the threats, risk and impact on the reputation of the UK if something was to happen. What really worries me more than anything else about today’s decision [is that] it set a new precedent that security can be used to control members of the family, and effectively, what it does is imprison other members of the family from being able to choose a different life… Ravec’s ability to make decisions outside of its own policies and the so-called political sensitivities of my case have prevailed over the need for fair and consistent decision-making. The court has decided to defer to this, revealing a sad truth: my hands are tied in seeking legal recourse against the establishment’. #KingCharlesTheCruel has been trending on X for several days now, this episode being further proof that the royals have more influence on politics and decision making than the longstanding narrative would have us believe.
It’s especially ironic and hypocritical, then, that ‘out of respect for surviving veterans’ the Royal Family have let it be known that they hope ‘nothing will detract or distract’ from VE Day commemorations this week, following Prince Harry’s interview. They might as well have said we hope the desperately embarrassing revelations of our political interference won’t wreck our ‘above politics’ golden image for good. Their ‘respect for surviving veterans’ comes across as rather hollow and they should have thought about this well before now. They had obviously assumed that any skullduggery would be hushed up but they were ambushed by the Prince’s frankness. All the pomp and ceremony of the VE Day nostalgia fest and royal family appearance on the Buckingham Palace balcony have so far not succeeded in quelling that #KingCharlestheCruel trending hashtag. At least, though, it was good that Prince Andrew was excluded from these VE events – interesting because he has been allowed to attend others, but that was before the suicide of Virginia Giuffre caused his murky past to rear its head again.
On the jingoistic VE Day exercise clearly intended to distract us from the worrying state of the world and of this country, I agree with veteran actress Sheila Hancock, who is concerned about the inaccurate emphasis on jollity that did indeed take place around the Palace in 1945 but which was underpinned by the reality of huge losses, poverty, anxiety and uncertainty about the future. Hancock observed: ‘My VE Day was nothing like our image of it today. I hope we can honour what it really meant… This month, we are commemorating the 80th anniversary of VE Day, and I worry that we will turn it into a yet another jingoistic celebration of the Second World War. Yes, in 1945 we were relieved that the bombs and doodlebugs and rocket weapons had stopped, and we heard there was fun going on in the West End of London – but where I lived it was less jubilant. The war there felt far from over’. She goes on to describe the difficulties that faced them and the strength needed ‘to face the inevitable struggle to dress the mental and physical wounds of war, and build the better, fairer, more peaceful world they wanted to create’. We now have several more days of these events, at heaven knows what cost to the public purse.
Another worrying piece of domestic news has been about the cyber attacks on UK retailers – M&S, Coop and now Harrods. Although very different in content I thought the Prince Harry and Coop stories had something in common: an assumption that one party could dominate the narrative, this collapsing when the other party speaks out. Because the royal household had assumed that Harry would not speak out as much as he has, the shocking revelations about the conduct of our King towards his son are now in the public domain. Likewise, the Coop had been giving false reassurance to customers about the safety of their data….until the hackers themselves spoke up and the Coop was forced to admit that more damage had been inflicted than their initial narrative suggested. As the hackers have told the media more attacks are to come, retailers and service providers will be feeling nervous indeed. But how secure are their IT systems? It’s often the case that these are out of date, inadequate for today’s environment and insufficiently invested in. The Harrods statement was hardly reassuring: ‘Our seasoned IT security team immediately took proactive steps to keep systems safe and as a result we have restricted internet access at our sites today’. ‘Seasoned is a strange word to use, suggesting dated and out of touch, and restricting access to the sites is surely the most basic intervention possible – customers have a right to expect better. Maybe this significant problem will have the effect of sending customers back to bricks and mortar stores.
On a final positive note, it’s been heartwarming to see the tributes paid to naturalist David Attenborough for his 99th birthday. I thought Chris Packham’s said it all: ‘It’s all about truth. Ask yourself, “Has David ever knowingly lied to me?” No, never. He may have told us things 40 years ago that science has updated, but he’s always told us the truth. In an age when it’s hard to trust anyone, that stands as his greatest asset’.
Politics and mental health - the missing link? 