A rude awakening from holiday,- Clegg squeaks up.

Just as we were all revelling in what we thought were the last few days of the politician-free summer holidays our snoozing was rudely interrupted by premature squeaking from the Clegg corner. It seems he has EasyJetted back back from Spain, presumably in an aircraft burning only eco renewable vegetation .If so somewhere in Spain they are a hundred or more acres shorter on tangleweed fields than they were before his flight took off.

His sense of timing in speaking to the Guardian was impeccably bad and his theme totally out of step with this extraordinary and very successful British summer. Timingwise, he obviously hasn't got it that the nation isn't yet ready for resumed political twittering and sanctimonious tweaking of its consciences .Next ,most of the nation is this very evening embarking on another ten days of shouting for Britain and individuals to win via a process in which sheer guts, determination and effort will succeed. Not the greatest moment to be hand wringing and promising to "hard wire" fairness into everything we do. In sport , fairness is defined only by the things just mentioned. Even they can not sometimes overcome good days and bad days, quirks of fortune and other unpredicatable variables. It isn't all fair for team GB , team anyone else or the individuals but they have to deal with it and may or may not win or lose. Fairness is never going to be hard wired into anything and anyway, the national mood isn't right now in tune with this sort of utterance. Since June there has been a lot of spontaneous and organised togetherness. Grumpy unions apart , a lot of people have pitched in , given their time for free, worked cooperatively in teams with people they never knew before and found,- no surprise,- that all the effort winning in whatever they were doing,- manning the venues, railway stations, running routes was immensely satisfying , pleasurable and had nothing to do with money. They have worked hard and made their own and each others' success. That's real fairness. Trying to tax winners, in this case the old standby "the rich",  to even things out is not. It's just a window dressing charade and almost always ends up with the Exchequer taking less money than it did before.At worst some of those affected move abroad and stop spending anything in the UK. Who suffers? Everyone,-the national purse, the builders, restauranters, shops,everyone all the way through to the newsagents, maintainence people and gardners. Less money jobs for everyone.Good outcome?

Not content with prattling on in this vein, Mr Clegg ended up saying of the forthcoming Part Conference  "This is the time when we (the Lib Dems) can spread out wings more" in differentiating the party from its uneasy coalition bedfellows via whose 2010 failure to secure an overall majority the Lib Dems are currently enjoying the trappings of Minsterial and other nice offices. There is no love or even vague loyalty here and future possible partners, that's to say Labour, will be observing Lib Dem behaviour closely . The sensible will be deciding that a coalition post 2015 would only be a very last resort. That makes it likely ,that faced with being the largest single party but lacking an overall majority , Labour would do what the Conservatives should have done in 2010 and run as a minority government for a few months,- mainly through the summer recess,- make sure they lose an early vote and then call a new election which they would be likely to win on a "Give us a proper chance or put up with 5 years of chaos and nothing happening" ticket.

The spreading of wings exhortation reminds eeerily of Liberal leader David Steele's laughable 1981 Party Conference exhortation to "Go back to your constituencies and prepare for government". At the time they were forming an alliance with the new Labour breakaway group, the SDP . At the next General Election in 1983 the two combined won a total of 23 seats.

Right now for anyone betting on 2015, whatever else happens to the balance between the two main parties,  the most likely outcome is a near wipeout for the Lib Dems. Unfair maybe Nick but that's reality whatever your hotwiring unit gets up to. There are ways to achieve a better result but trashing the coalition and rendering it impotent for the next 2-3 yeats only guarantees an outright Labour victory.

The Silly Season is upon us. "Parliament may close for 5 years"- Sunday Times headline.

Yes, there it was to cheer us all up this morning. But...of course it was too good to be true and the article was about the need to refurbish the place, strip out asbestos, century old plumbing and ancient electric wiring . It wasn't  a scheme just to shut up its incumbents and let the country sort itself out without them for 5 years.

Putting that aside what else has occupied the "Silly Season" this past week?

-The core of the season,-when the media scrape any ballel for stories as the world is on holiday,- is this year squeezed from its usual six weeks during the core school holidays into about three. That's the gap between the pages-filling Olympics and the slighly less pages-filling Paralympics which will give a final ten day burst to Britain's carnival summer which started with the Royal Jubilee in June. The politicians are on hols bar the odd photoshoot of Dave, one in the sun at a Spanish cafe and one, yesterday, bravely sitting outside another in Cornwall  between heavy bursts of rain. Nobody has bothered to photograph Ed in Greece , Nick in Spain or any of the Ballses anywhere. Goodness knows or cares where all the rest are, but hopefully they really are on holiday , having a good time and taking in some deep gulps of fresh air to aerate the grey cells so that, genuinely refreshed , they can contemplate the world unbefuddled, from some new angles and with revitalised energy. There's no harm in hoping.

-Shock horror from disappointed parents, children, teachers and their ghastly unions who exist in a world of denial that all teachers everywhere are anything but excellent. (One thing they never do is ask the kids, never mind the parents, for a view). Some grade boundaries have been re-set . That has produced a 0.4 % decline in average grades this year after years of constant inflation while real standards have declined. True, that  it is tough on those who can say that if they'd sat the exams last January or last year when the barriers were lower they would have got a higher grade but the process needs to continue for quite a while as standards are moved up, questions are made more demanding and more weight is given to exams rather than ongoing course work so that the answers genuinely come from the pupils , not Mum and Dad or Wikipedia.

-More shock horror, sanctimonious handwringing and the like from some quarters over right royal goings on in Las Vegas on the part of Prince Harry. The man is 27, single, is a real soldier/airman, knows that the batchelor life can't last much longer, so what can one expect. Interestingly 68% of the British population range from slightly bemused to "good on you" stances. The remaining 32% range from "How can he do this when we are facing austerity (what?),-why isn't he sharing our pain?" through layers of the hypocritical whose real thoughts are probably more like "Lucky ------" to those who genuinely do feel that he is too old for these kinds of displays and should grow up and act with decorum. With the latter one can sympathise but the rest...no.  The Prince probably does though need to discard some of his hangers-on who will probably never grow up and now best left behind.

-Over in America, BAe who have invested heavily in the country in hopes of gaining access to its military market lost its bid to build a new Humvee for the army. No surprise other than that BAe, not all American boys however much they like to look like ones, should be surprised. Not long ago they were beneficiaries when Airbus won a contract to supply a tanker/transport version of the A330 to replace the US Air Force tanker fleet. Howls of anguish all round. Eventually the contract was suspended, the specification rewritten to fit a smaller aircraft and lo and behold the rerun went to a version of the Boeing 767 whose well amortised  civil production line is winding down. The real home team won. Let's be realistic. It always will.

-While still on that side of the Atlantic, viewers from this side of the pond can only gape as the Republican  Party wheels out a Presidential candidate and running mate whose agendas look so illiberal, (no to abortion)  bellicose (Middle East), hard faced (opposition to Obama's abandonment of a"pay or die" health regime), as to be downright scary. That may also be true in the Democrat heartlands most familiar to foreigners,- the North East and West Coast but in those areas where few from overseas tread they are part of what people believe America is or should be. Frighteningly for the rest of the world many/most Republicans really do believe they have God on their side. And their version of God isn't a particularly smiley one.

-As for Syria the cent/ penny about known and unknown genies unbottled by the events has begun to drop in Washington and London. Assad has been warned not to think about using his store of chemical weapons (wonder where those came from?) with a rider that nobody else should think of using them either. With the eventual outcome of this particular branch of the Arab Spring which has moved through a number of stages from demonstrations to civil war almost impossible to predict other than that Assad will eventually go, there are  grave concerns about who might eventually end up posessing this nasty pile and what they might do with them.

-South Africa has had a bad week. A three cornered but more multi faceted than that spat between two rival unions and the mining company Lonmin, for which read any other mine employer opens up some of the fault lines facing the country and why it isn't getting the new inward investment it needs to provide a vast number of new jobs. In the mix are the rough, tough nature of the country's unions, the fact that much of South Africas's mining wealth has always been founded on cheap labour, the needs of businesses to stay competitive with (low) Asian wage rates, the failure of the employers and government to upgrade the physical living conditions for the miners and the poor and to get rid of the extensive shanty towns with their lack of adequate water ,electricity ,sanitation and paved roads , where crime and brutality inevitably thrive. Expectations from the New South Africa were always higher than could be met in the short term but the lack of visible improvement in many areas has produced enormous pressures very close to the surface. In the rural districts, especially in the Transvaal , this has been manifested by ongoing murders of white farmers, mainly Afrikaaners. Elsewhere including in the vast sprawling shanty towns between Capetown and the nearby wine growing and resort area at Somerset West and around the mines ,it is surprising that there has not been more trouble. Urgent action and a lot of money is urgently needed to improve conditions all round. Failing that it is difficult to see how things can remain as peaceful as they are.

-Closer to home Eurowoes continue. Hasn't it ever occured to most Eurozone leaders that when those who want to cut a deal, gain more time etc, they don't go to Amsterdam, Luxemburg or anywhere other than just the two places, Berlin and Paris. Doesn't that tell the rest that for all their denials that they have lost any sovereignty in signing up to "The Project" they have indeed done just that and when the chips are down there are only two players who call the shots? It's not much different for the non Eurozone E U countries either. Fine if all the member states are really happy with that but how many have put the question to their citizens?
Meanwhile both Germany and France have given some short term comfort to the Greek " We need more time" supplication . After initially looking very stony faced about the idea ,both countrys'  "Greece must stay in the Euro" statements make it look as if Athens' day of reckoning may be delayed and billions more thrown in to achieve that respite. That looks like an  expensive form of denial. It is unlikely that a Greek exit would be disastrous for the Euro. In fact it could be regarded as a useful trial of the whole process and effects of an a country binning the joint currency and provide useful learning about how to handle other looming and much bigger resource sapping candidates.

Usually Britain's August bank on the last Monday of the month holiday signals a mass return from summer holiday retreats and the imminent beginning of the new school term and the nation being almost all back to work for the first time since "the season" began with Ascot, Henley and Wimbledon in June. This year because of the way the dates fall, that doesn't happen until after next weekend, the first in September. Then there are a few more days lull while everyone readjusts, buys new uniforms, and basks in the last of the summer (?) weather as the first autumnal early morning dew and that unmistakeable nip in the air arrives . On Monday 10th September UK Plc will be almost 100%  back at its desks, facing the post summer hangover, holiday credit card bills, and reaquainting itself with some daunting economic and political realities. The Party conferences will be there to help us .As a curtain raiser the brothers and sisters will have opened the Trade Union Congress annual snarl and rant the previous day. It must be a really fun thing to go to.

The Post Olympic Week,- a quick roundup.

As many of the athletes headed for Heathrow and home on Monday morning after a weekend  of celebrations or sorrows drowning some of Britain returned to mid summer normality and headed back to their offices for the two and a half weeks until the Paralympics. More though also headed to Heathrow and airports around the country to head off on their hols, leaving those at home to enjoy August peace.

The three dear political leaders (OK Nick , we will give you the benefit of the doubt and Ed we know you like to be called that)headed off to Eurozone disaster area. Nick went to the outlaws in Spain and Dave went somewhere not far away though there seems to be some doubt whether he will be asked over for Sunday lunch. With those two in Spain, Ed headed for basket case Greece to feel their pain and hopefully give generously help their financial problems. All very nice and chillaxing but why not try something different, somewhere buzzing and away from Eurozone woes. The typhoons in Hong Kong may not have gone down too well with the ladies but the opportunity to stroll around any of the major 24 hours a day Go-for-It cities of Asia could have given them just the adrenaline or caffeine boosted  feelings they need to get them into a positive frame of mind to bring back to their day jobs. All British MPs could do with walking ,-without minders, advisors , hangers on,-the streets of Hong Kong,Shanghai, Singapore or even Bangkok if they could avoid the obvious nocturnal pitfalls. The daytime hyperactivity ,the night markets, the constant hearing of the word "Dollar" in streets, buses, cafes, restaurants, undergrounds, lifts , materialistic though it might sound would give them a clue that it's time to get the good old home country up and on its feet and actually doing things. The same goes for Euro MPs but maybe that's a hope too far.

Back at the ranch William Hague has been left holding all the babies and waiting to field any unseasonal curved balls. Unfortunately for him there have been some. The harsh threat to invade the Ecuadorian embassy was uncharacteristic and a mistake. It also added to a feeling of unease that all is far from transparent in the Assange saga and that the USA is pulling strings in persuit of their objective of getting their hands on him and that somewhere in the mix the UK is playing its unreciprocated supine role. There looks like being a lot more to this saga than meets the eye and there is more to come on this one.

Meanwhile the Afghanistan adventure looks more and more doomed by the day. For all the billions spent on trying to stabalise the country, and assign the Taliban to history ,there is little other than an ever mounting pile of corpses to show for it. The fiction that it has been a battle worth fighting is maintained by all UK political parties as Labour (Blair) started it and the coalition , to avoid also embarrassing the US and themselves at home ,have failed to get out of the country and accept that ultimately only Afghans will solve Afghanistan. Once the western occupying forces have left the country the Afghans will be able to turn their attention to dealing with the little loved Taliban and the heartily disliked foreign jihadists . Until then the presence of the westerners acts as the only thing which unites their opponents.

Syria doesn't look at all good either and again the role of the west is not helpful. The Arab Spring was all heady stuff  and destined to succeed in some places and, for the time being at least, fail in others as the situations and ingredients in each of the countries are all different. Libya was relatively straightforward with clear options and one side identifiable as baddies (Gaddafi) and the other as at least relative, if disparate , goodies (all the rest). Syria though is a myriad of different factions and interests, some local and some foreign. The Soviets are determined to hang on to their only Mediterranean port, the Iranians see it as an opportunity to meddle, cause confusion and mayhem and ultimately to advance the cause of Persian domination over the otherwise Arab region, using religion as its justifier, the foreign jihadists have their own agenda and Assad doesn't fancy losing power. None is talking democracy or of relatively polite MPs representing orderly constituencies sitting in neat rows and talking through "Mr Speaker sir". Meanwhile in the alleged interests of promoting enforced democracy,  foreigners of all kinds , including the UK ,are flocking to aid anyone falling under the loose definition of "rebels" as if these were indeed honourable, altruistic and democratic groups. In Iraq Saddam brutally dealt with any opposition but his removal has involved hundreds of thousands of innocent civilian deaths, far more than even decades more of his rule would have achieved. Under his iron fist Iraq at least functioned as a country in which most citizens could live in safety and things basically worked . Baghdad was a functiong city. The country was also a secular state in which all religions and branches thereof were tolerated, albeit some more than others. Now it isn't. The same is happening in Syria . The viable state, towns and villages in which most people were safe most of the time are now being reduced to rubble, much of it again falling on innocent civilians . To them getting on with everyday life is worth more than an uncertain democracy designed by foreigners. Worst of all, just as in Afghanistan during the Russian occupation, the regime topplers are flooding the place with arms and ammunition which guarantee instablity, fighting and more deaths for years to come. Mr Hague has just thrown in another £5 million for "communications equipment". So much for his (European) summer.


Putin's Russia can seldom resist the chance to machinegun its own feet when its leader's blood pressure is pushed up by any sign of protest particularly if it involves any kind of disrespect, humour or fresh new and young public appeal. Pussy Riot has got right up his nose and induced extreme sense of humour failure, not that there's a lot that's funny in Russia in the first place. It is little wonder its citizens, in public at least ,are not given to oubursts of great hilarity unless of course the vodka has taken hold. Aided and abetted by that other bastion of Russian repression and the  "Know your place and don't question anything " philosophy and illiberatism, the Russian Orthodox Church, one of whose leaders has described Putin's regime as a wonderful miracle, the Pussys are to enjoy two years in the slammer. That's not good for anybody's health and does nothing for anybody's wellbeing and certainly not Russia's or Putin's. Always fear those without humour. They are very dangerous anywhere.

Across the Channel the Euro goes staggering on. As almost all European politicians are away for most of August it isn't getting all the attention it needs and the Euro supertanker sails on ever closer to the rocks while the Captains, other ironically than Mrs Merkells, pretend they see none. More alarmingly some even continue to believe there actually aren't any and that if there really turn out to be some the German lifeboat will sail out to rescue them . They can't have noticed the steely look in Mrs Merkells' eye. Foolish. She is very clear about her agenda.

The domestic political scene is seasonally and thankfully quiet certainly as far as Labour and the Lib Dems are concerned.  It's not quiet enough though for the Tory machine to avoid stumbling  into its own PR bear traps. Inconsistency is a big problem for them in trying to avoid the "nasty party" image. It is a mistake while calling for one Olympic legacy to be more sport in schools (though how many potential Olympians will be deterred for ever by good old fashioned compulsory school sports is another matter) for Michael Gove to quietly slip out relaxations to the rules governing the sale of school sports fields. Whether intended or not, this looks too much like wicked Tories helping out old mates in the property development business. This is something which the otherwise highly intelligent Mr Gove should have understood, foreseen and avoided. Tim Yeo, Chairman of the the Commons Environmental Audit Committee and  a member of The Commons Energy and Climate Change Committe having paid roles with the green industry isn't too bright an idea by the Party either. Consistency, Consistency, Consistency is essential for a coherent, honest and credible political party. Time for a crack of the Whip Mr Cameron.

Have a good and warm weekend. Spend any Euros in your pocket while the going's good.

Olympic Gold,- a political takeaway.

The success of London's Olympics has so far been stunning, not just for the althletes or Team GB and the enormously enthusiastic spectators but for the UK rising to the occasion and delivering something many , in particular the ever-carping media and even more carping BBC believed it never could. The feeling of fun, the efforts of the 70,000 McDonalds trained volunteers, the transport and logistics seen and unseen have been magnificent. Above all, rising above the appalling weather of most of the summer, the economic gloom (would you like your recession double or triple?), Britain has delivered a message it is still very much in business and that given the right leadership, drive to get things done and high profile stage: "Yes we can".

This is in blinding contrast to the acccustomed drip feed, starting in some classrooms and thereafter reinforced by burocracy ,dumbing down , political correctness,over regulation, EU directives ,labour "agreements" and disincentives of all kinds of "No you can't".

It has also made competing and winning respectable. It has shown that untiring endeavour against all kinds of odds, the endurance of  personal pain and sacrifices and utter commitment to an aim can achieve success and is worth going for. Also it is no use blaming anyone else for unlevel playing fields, perceived injustices, family backgrounds, traumatic youth,- the only way is to forget all that and get on with it. Your life is your own and you don't need to call in the counsellors.

All this came as a surprise to many pundits .The largely London metrocentric miserabalist media are much happier with "the cuts", "It'll never work", "It's unfair" headlines. Their judgement of national and regional mood has long been poor. Like politicians and some diplomats, they don't sit and listen in the right places. They tend to talk amongst themselves and those of like minds in a somewhere out of this world social bubble. Many of them were caught seriously off guard by popular enthusiasm for the Royal Jubilee and couldn't understand it until almost too late. The admiration for the incredible devotion to duty displayed by the Queen  and Duke of Edinburgh standing for over two hours on a rain drenched barge and its reciprocation by even more drenched spectators .  Add the admiration for the perseverance on that day's finale by the Royal College of Music's Chamber Choir of frozen drowned rats and there was every reason for a rethink about how the Olympics should be handled.

The media should be grateful for the right royal warning but even then they continued in largely downbeat vein until, a few days before the Games began they appeared to realise that they risked being starkly out of step with the real national mood . They suddenly changed foot, willingly or unwillingly ,and adopted an upbeat, fun, enthralled even ,approach. The BBC's commentators have been so sucessful that now their Director General has told  them to cool the patriotism.

A huge Olympic bonus has come from an unexpected quarter. The absence from our screens of politicians and politics. Only the ebullient Boris Johnson has made an impression. There have been occasional glimpses of others, especially Dave who always looks as if he's wearing a suit even when he isn't, and Ashen Nick who  has only appeared only once (see below for the success that wasn't). Of  New Old Labour the Eds and the rest have been absent, maybe abroad, who cares? Too much about competition, winning, doing it by the sweat of peoples' own brows and even fun for socialist fundamentalists. They have to feel (your but seldom their own ) pain, struggle but of course never win as that would be elitist. Therein lies their lack of appeal and why what they sell  doesn't work.

But it's worse for them than that. London 2012 has been all about getting it done (even at the expense of having to expensively and unnecessarily buy off the slab faced union heavies), delivering, doing things NOW. It's been about positivism ,being upbeat, overcoming problems on the hoof  and sweeping obstacles out of the way, not about needing further discussions, having an enquiry ,doing nothing, obstructing, preaching. Only Boris, seen as the political face of the Olympics has come out a winner . That, despite being lambasted as an Etonian toff, sometimes looking like a buffoon, is because instead of being grey and dull and from another planet he seems to many from the top of society to the bottom to be very much of this one. He is fun, speaks "human", and off the cuff, can engage easily and unpatronisingly with anyone, doesn't mind making  mistakes and is unconventional. Whether or not he would make a good Prime Minister is another matter but he would at least start by being a popular one.

This raises the bar for the coming political season starting with the "Conferences" in September to Olympian levels. It was ironic that in the middle of this festival of "Go for it", "Get it done", Clegg chose to solemnly announce that his party would give the Tories an illiberal retaliatory black eye for being unable to deliver House of Lords reform, something about 2% of the country regard as a priority.  On the same day  Ms. Mensch announced that she would be quitting as an MP only 2 years into her 5 year term, thereby ditching those who voted for her and leaving her party with an almost unwinnable by-election. So much for Olympian spirit by both of them. They probably expected big headlines as if anyone cared. They got them for a few short hours and then slipped off the screens again and out of sight. Most people just didn't give a damn. That's where they both have helped the interest in and status and respect of politics and politicians to come to.

 The message to Dave, Nick and Ed therefore is that they have by default allowed the summers' big events to highlight them and their programmes as dull, pedestrian, unimaginitave, lacking in "Can do" and " Now!" None of them has a " Man,-or even Person,- of the People" image. It may be too late for any of them to do anything about it .That being the case ,their parties have to find new ways out of the post Blair/Brown mess with fresh leaders, new bounce and sense of connecting with the electorate. For a start the furrowed brows, studied seriousness, indignation  and greyness have to go. That's just where Boris, surrounded by an energetic and able team to actually do the biz could burst upon the stage. It's probably the Conservatives' and even the country's only hope. For Nick and friends in wind powered, Europe-hugging la la land there is no hope and for the Eds and their Olympics-ransoming union paymasters let's pray there's none either.