Quote for the Week 11

'When push comes to shove, the pounds, the dollars and deutschmarks can't be equal. They can't all be at the same standard.'
- Geri Halliwell expresses her concerns about the European single currency, 1996

Quote for the Week 10

'Yes, the resulting deal may be totally undemocratic, but if the single-currency members couldn't take a joke they ought not to have signed up.'
- Dan Atkinson on the current crisis for the Euro.

Quote for the Week 9

'You cannot build the New Jerusalem on a mountain of debt.'
- Gordon Brown to the Labour Party conference, 1997

Yesterday's Papers - Shooting People Is Wrong

As both Jeremy Clarkson and the BBC apologise for his suggestion that state sector workers who go on strike should be taken outside and shot, it's hard not to have a sense of deja vu. This is from a report on the Brand Republic website dated 29 November 2009:

...Ofcom has also announced that a complaint levelled at comedian Jeremy Hardy, following his suggestion that BNP voters should be 'shot in the back of the head' has now also been resolved.

Hardy made the remark on his BBC Radio 4 show Jeremy Hardy Speaks to the Nation on September 9. Ofcom said it did not think the remarks were intended to endorse violent behaviour.

Flashman

Watching Prime Minister's Questions this afternoon, I was struck again by the way that Ed Balls shouts 'Flashman' at David Cameron whenever the prime minister makes a personal attack on Ed Miliband.

There's nothing wrong, of course, with the privately educated Balls (Nottingham Boys School) suggesting that Cameron (Eton) might give the impression of being a public school bully, picking on poor little Miliband (Haverstock Comprehensive).

But it does make me wonder where this righteous class anger was back in the days when Tony Blair (Fettes) was having a go at a succession of state-educated Tory leaders: John Major (Rutlish Grammar), William Hague (Wath-upon-Dearne Comprehensive), Iain Duncan Smith (St Peter's Secondary) and Michael Howard (Llanelli Grammar).

Quote for the Week 8

'Instead of monopolising the seat of judgement, journalism should be apologising in the dock.' - Oscar Wilde

Critical thinking

I'm very taken with a blogger named Mondale, who has nice things to say about my book, Crisis? What Crisis?

Proff Reading (slight return)

This is from the memoirs of Kenneth Baker, chairman of the Conservative Party in the last days of Margaret Thatcher:

'My first real memories stem from that time, and the outbreak of war. The radio was crucially important, and I remember hearing tunes like Run, Rabbit, Run, Who Do You Think You're Kidding, Mr Hitler? and Hang Out the Washing on the Siegried Line.' - Kenneth Baker, The Turbulent Years (Faber & Faber, 1993) pp.4-5

Well, probably not. Who Do You Think You Are Kidding, Mr Hitler? was written in 1968 by Jimmy Perry as the theme song to Dad's Army.

My Generation @ The Public

... and talking of Harry Goodwin, it's nice that the BBC website is publicising the My Generation exhibition of his photos, which arrived yesterday at The Public in West Bromwich. Do go, and make sure you pick up a copy of the excellent book that (I hope) is on sale.

What a very strange man he was

In memory of the late Jimmy Savile, here's a picture of him taken by Harry Goodwin and taken from My Generation: The Glory Years of British Rock (V&A, 2010):

Further to my last post...

The Dimbleby-hosted Any Questions on BBC radio lives these days somewhat in the shadow of the Dimbleby-hosted Question Time on BBC television. It's an impression that's hardly dispelled by the way they seem to share the same booking policy.

So last night's programme featured a panel comprising a Tory MP, an ex-Tory MP turned journalist and a Lib Dem MP. Oh, and there was a Labour MP as well.

Again there's that feeling that political debate in the country is concentrated almost exclusively within the coalition and their fellow-travellers. The Labour Party continues to look marginal at best.

And perhaps there's a pattern emerging with Labour's choice of panellists. On Question Time it was the 39-year-old Gloria de Piero, already a member of Ed Miliband's shadow team barely a year after her election. On Any Questions it was the 32-year-old Rachel Reeves, already a member of Ed Miliband's shadow team barely a year after her election.

Neither has any political weight or status at this stage, but maybe that's the point. These are the potential stars of the next parliament being given a chance to get a bit of exposure and experience. The unmistakable impression, however, is that Labour's given up on the idea of opposition for the immediate future and is building for the world after the next election.

The Man Who Wasn't There

As I was going up the stairs
I saw a man who wasn’t there;
He wasn’t there again today...

While the usual suspects on the Eurosceptic right (Simon Heffer, Norman Tebbit et al) continued to demonstrate that they haven't quite got the hang of this coalition business, and as the government took its collective sledgehammer to some backbench nuts, there was a missing voice in the coverage of this week's debate about a possible EU referendum.

It happened again on the BBC's Question Time this evening. The panel comprised a Tory cabinet minister, a Tory peer, a Lib Dem and the leader of the UKIP. Oh, and there was a Labour MP as well. But she had nothing to say.

Where exactly is the Labour Party these days? I know that it had problems after the election, when Gordon Brown disappeared in a puff of sulk and the media decided that the coalition was a much more interesting story, but that was last year. It really should be making a bit more of the running by now.

Admittedly Labour is ahead in the opinion polls. But not by much. And the gap was wider during the summer (six to eight percentage points) than it has been over the last month or so (three to five points). Or to put it another way, the party was doing better when all the politicians were on holiday and there was an absence of debate.

Which does seem to be the problem. It feels as though Labour has a lead in the polls simply because they exist and aren't in the government. And as long as no one listens to a word they say, they'll stumble along as a protest option. But while the government is obviously unpopular - how could it not be? - that's not going to be enough.

Around this stage of the first government of Margaret Thatcher, when she was also pursuing unpopular economic policies, the Labour Party was touching 50 per cent in the polls, not the 40 to 42 per cent that it's stuck on now. Even in the early days of Michael Foot's leadership, the party had a massive lead in the polls.

The truth is that polls at this point aren't of any significance. What's important is trying to seize some kind of control of the agenda. And Ed Miliband's Labour Party is doing nothing of the kind.