Election 2024 - The Shadow of the Past

 The election campaign has been galvanised by the Prime Minister's unexpected attempt to recapture the magic of the Tories golden years in the 1950s. No, not a sudden assault on Egypt to retake control of the Suez canal but, in the words of the Daily Telegraph

Rishi Sunak has vowed to bring back National Service for 18-year-olds to create a “renewed sense of pride in our country” in his first policy announcement of the election campaign...

This idea seems to have come from nowhere. It has not featured in Conservative manifestos of recent years, nor did Sunak wow the party conference last October by donning a beret and posing with beaming 18 year olds who just could not wait to get down to Caterham and start shovelling coke behind the mess hall. 

Naturally one might expect the top brass at the War Office to be delighted. And one would be wrong. The headline in The Independent the day after read

Ex-military chief says Rishi Sunak’s national service plan is ‘bonkers’

 Britain has changed. Huge numbers of young people aspire to university or college education when they leave school, not to put on uniform and march up and down barracks squares for the gratification of their sergeant-major. Even if the idea of doing something for one's country were to be popular, they wish to choose what they do, not to be conscripted by a faceless Whitehall bureacracy. Presumably Sunak is aiming this policy at older Tory voters who still nurture strange ideas about "discipline" and "respect"; the conscripts of the 1950s certainly learned how to smoke furtive cigarettes by cupping them in one hand behind their backs but this was the generation that produced the artistic flowering of the 60s, the satire boom and the biggest shift away from deference to authority ever seen in this country. 

Details of how the scheme would work are sketchy but it does not seem to involve compulsory service; volunteering either for military support duties or work in the community are being touted. According to Sky.com

Exactly how the scheme would work has not yet been hammered out. The Tories have said they would set up a royal commission - a type of public inquiry - to come up with the details.

 however we do have some information

Conservative MPs have given various examples of the kinds of volunteering teenagers could do, including delivering prescriptions or food to infirm people, being a lifeguard, supporting communities during storms and working with search and rescue.

All is well. The next time it rains we can call up the King's Own Waterproofs Brigade and be personally shepherded to the bus stop under the protection of a trained umbrella-holder, first class. Instructions in the fitting of galoshes will be given by keen youngsters in village halls. Ranks of eager kids will be taught to say "Looks like it's clearing up" and "Wrap up warm, now" before being let loose on householders contemplating another ruined carpet. And traditional techniques will not be lost either - a couple of weeks filling, stacking, moving and emptying sandbags at Aldershot should beat a bit of discipline and respect into the long-haired, work-shy, don't-know-they're-born, generation who are sure to vote Tory in future elections out of gratitude. Yup, that'll definitely work.

Election 2024 - An Unexpected Party Political

 Mrs C and I were enjoying a well-earned cup of tea yesterday, on a damp and disappointingly chilly May afternoon, when the bland afternoon TV coverage switched to a damp and chilly Downing Street where a podium had been put up outside Number 10.  Political correspondents spoke of rumours about an election. We watched, fascinated, as the podium was moved a bit and the rain continued to lash down. 

With little warning, the door was opened and the Prime Minister emerged to tell us that he had had a chat with Charlieboy and Parliament was to be dissolved for an election on 4 July. He then tried to explain what a great bloke he was, and how great everything the government had done had been and why we should all vote for him. Unfortunately our attention was diverted to the wet patches running down his jacket and to the discordant sound of a pop song played loudly just outside the gates to Downing Street (My sources later informed me that this was D:Ream's "Things Can Only Get Better", the anthem to Labour's 1997 landslide).

This move has certainly taken everyone by surprise. Summer elections are unusual. Sunak was expected to try to big things up at the party conference in the autumn, perhaps on the back of a tax cut, perhaps after sending the first few hapless migrants to Rwanda. There are rumours that Tory MPs were poised for a no-confidence vote and he decided to strike first. Others suggest that this has been to get a jump on Reform who have been nibbling at the traditional Conservative vote. Still others opined that, the rate of inflation having fallen to about 2.5%, this is a golden opportunity to boast about sound economic management (while keeping very quiet indeed about the last few years).

This will be the first election I will witness from my new constituency, having moved from Uxbridge and South Ruislip (seat of part-time strolling PM B Johnson) to the rural surroundings of Stratford on Avon, seat of the retiring ex-chancellor Nadim Zahawi, who featured (anonymously) in these columns not so long ago. I suspect that there will be little in the way of canvassing around here but we will see.

The timing of this election is not good news for the many post office managers, wrongly accused of fraud by a conspiracy of the directors of the Post Office and of software supplier Fujitsu; the news about the hearings will now be downgraded. And only in the last couple of days has the PM apologised for the long running NHS infected blood scandal, and promised compensation to the victims. Will this promise be quietly shelved on the grounds that it is now a matter for the new government?

One might also wonder if the PM is hoping for a bounce should England or Scotland do well in the Euro Football Championships - if either survive to election day then they will be in the quarter-finals, and this would surely be a huge boost to the feel-good factor. Will Harry win it for Rishi?