Thank God He Has Gone?

The politics of the Grenfell Tower fire in London was summarised for me in Channel 4 News, and in later, similar comments on BBC 2 Newsnight. This was the claim, however true or not, that the cladding on the tower that went on fire so rapidly was to beautify the tower for the wealthy nearby residents, and this is why a recent upgrade could include such absences of fire protection and combustible material for the actual, poor, residents. And with legal aid provision withdrawn, these residents lacked the ability to challenge what was taking place around them. We forget that in cities people in poverty can live right next to the wealthy, especially so in London, and the fear now is that when this tower block is knocked down the replacement will not be social housing.

As well as this event, I want to mention also another programme on TV tonight, again on BBC 2 between 9 and 10 pm. It was an attempt to see if a group of travellers on a terrible rail franchise south east of London could meet the conditions for a bid. All along the way, the Department of Transport put traps in their way: and they found the fifty million pounds suddenly required of them, and even then they were rejected. The fact is we have railway companies subsidised to make a profit for lousy rented services (trains etc.) that don't work, many of the profits going abroad to State owned railways to subsidise their social fares. Not once did this programme mention the most obvious thing to do: either nationalise the whole thing and make it credible again (e.g. ticketing) or so arrange the finances so that the whole thing is one functioning private company with full flexibility of ticketing.

Two issues in this country that matter: poverty, inequality and absence of basic standards, and a "not fit for purpose" (House of Commons pre-election) system by which the corporate pals of government can arrange finance and set-ups to milk the railways.

Was it wise during a very tragic and politically charged fire in London for Tim Farron to announce his resignation? Was he going quietly so no one would notice, or did he just carry on as normal? I'm not sure. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, and hard-hearted as it may seem activities do continue.

There is more than a hint in his resignation speech that being a biblical Christian and “remaining faithful to Christ” was incompatible with being his party’s leader. He is liberal to his fingertips about the rights of others to live as they will, but clearly he was implying that being a biblical Christian doesn't allow that for him or others like him. Indeed, just a little earlier, Lord Paddick resigned from his position citing Tim Farron's views, but also a regret that he felt that Farron could not be a committed Christian and leader of the Liberal Democrats.

This raises a question whether he was lying in the election when he said he does not regard gay sex as a sin. It raises the question what exactly does he regard as incompatible between living as a biblical Christian and running a liberal party in 2017. Perhaps he thinks the Bible thinks gay sex is a sin and he does not. But that raises another question about him as this committed Christian.

Who cares, once he is no longer a leader? Of course many would want to question his assumptions about being a committed Christian and regarding gay sex as sinful. There is the whole question of context. Does Tim Farron approve, for example, of recent decisions by the United Reformed Church and the Scottish Episcopal Church? Presumably he approves of the opt outs in liberal fashion, but what about church marriages with same sex couples who will shortly go to bed with each other and sexually?

I don't wish to overdo my criticism. Theresa May is an Anglican Christian, known to have made anti-lesbian statements in Merton, London, and is socially conservative. She would press a nuclear button and when a nurse in the General Election campaign almost wept that her pay was falling back in real terms year by year, all that May could say was that there is no money tree. No comassion there then. Tim Farron is the far better example of Christian, as both Christian and politician.

I suggest something else, too, regarding his resignation. Early on I had a sense that Farron just was not up to the job. I could have been wrong, and he might have become a Charles Kennedy. The election campaign might throw up some positive surprises. This is what Jeremy Corbyn did, after all, who was transformed from someone who could not run his office to someone who could campaign and run his office. Farron was overshadowed, as well as lacked traction on the European argument before the negotiations began, before the economy started to go seriously wrong. In two years it would have been different.

But he was just crap. He was also robotic, like Theresa May, in voice and presentation even if he did answer questions. He was not a leader. He might have been all they had, given that he voted against the Bedroom Tax and kept his promise regarding tuition fees. Nevertheless, in a time when government competence will be in short supply, the Liberal Democrats need to rebuild with a leader with gravistas. The Tory voter will be looking for somewhere to go soon, and the fact is that a Labour government will only have a majority if the third party recovers. Votes that went to a two party system (and allows the Tories to crow about their vote numbers) have to return to a three or even four party system. That way Labour wins: it is how it won (except perhaps the first time) under Blair.

If Vince becomes leader (say) then the party will be seen to have a heavyweight leader and attractive to Tories fed up with incompetence, narrow interests and lack of direction in the government neither restored nor refreshed. Vince will have instant appeal, because he can talk about competence in the coalition even if it annoys lefties who voted Liberal Democrat. After all, the lefties and young will now be voting Labour, and Vince will be appealing to those who have a better view of the coalition than I did, for example.

So goodbye Tim and it never did happen. A Calvinist in me says it was never going to happen under you so it is wise to have stood down, even if the day is unfortunate timing when others reflect on tragedy and the wider causes of tragedy.

Church Tourism Derails Somewhat

My plan for today was to visit, for the first time, a 'Cafe Church' Fresh Expressions held by a Hull URC church. I arrived before time, to discover that it had been cancelled because "Everyone had gone home" after a previous service. The previous service was a youth one, because this church is connected to some young people's organisations.

The minister told me it was cancelled for this reason; the woman alongside said I had attended the previous week. He told me it would start up again.

However, he did not ask for contact details. So what would I do? Turn up again only to find it cancelled again? In my Unitarian experience, ha ha, if one person turns up you run the service. I have been there with three plus a minister.

I don't think it was likely but there was an outside chance I might find a place there. Parking is awkward, indeed takes time in The Avenues. Well, I won't return now.

So I wondered what I would do. Instead of going home I knew that Holy Trinity (Hull Minster) ran its 'traditional' service at 11:15, and I was back at the car at 11:01. I didn't much fancy it, but there might be something else to learn.

I arrived 2 minutes late in the church itself. I just could not participate and even the final blood-curdling hymn caused me to close the book. I counted about 50 plus in the space including 18 in the robed choir. I was told by this woman afterwards that some from the choir and a few were at this decaon's ordination in York; indeed she would preside at her first Eucharist in the evening service.

The service was taken by the main fairly folksy priest. The woman I spoke with mentioned above said about the URC no attendance that it is secularisation, and she had just written an essay on it for the Open University. Sociologist? No, historian. She said about pre-First World War so I said oh yes that 1913 was the high point for church attendance but in fact it only kept pace with the rise in the general population. I told her I had a speciality in Presbyterian and Unitarian history, indeed how Presbyterians and Independents worshipped in the Nave at Holy Trinity before being kicked out after the Restoration.

This woman had trained as a midwife in Ipswich when she knew a Unitarian family. She said that they are Quakers now. I said each are like 'cousins', neither containing demands for doctrine.

Now the preacher was only training to be a Lay Reader. Quite elderly I thought (!) but when does one become a Lay Reader? His sermon had been on Rublev's Trinity ikon inviting us in, plus references to the 1 Corinthians and the read-out Matthew Trinity-like statements. I said to him that these are not doctrine of the Trinity statements. He didn't disagree, although I could tell he wanted to disagree. He agreed Matthew is a late insertion. I said that the early Christians were not trinitarians, and Paul certainly was not. I could see here too that he wanted to disagree, but could not. I said the gospels are trying to say that Jesus was appointed, chosen as Messiah by God, and I said John's gospel is closer to Arian. He agreed! I said there was no inevitability that it would end up as Trinitarian, and indeed at the Reformation the proof of this was when some retained the Church doctrines they were trinitarian, but those who read the Bible alone in Eastern Europe were not. So he said if Jesus was only (at best) Arian, it affects salvation. So I asked why? I said if you take John's Gospel, it says In the beginning and in Arianism Jesus is the first born of all creation. He said yes but Jesus says 'Before Abraham was I am' so I asked how that changes anything and, of course, he could not say.

I did point out that I was not Arian myself, and also that the Trinitarian was a construction in the context of Roman Empire. "Oh you think that?" he said. "Yes."

For me the service was full of clutter. OK, there is a surface appreciation of choir-sung bits, but they may as well sing forms of nonsense. I know I rather like being an argumentative sod unpicking assumptions in sermons, but there is no future in it. Like the last time I visited (and I was remembered), I just detected that people are well aware of all the arguments but just go along with it. I call it self-deception and I am no longer interested in pursuing that. The liturgy struck me as so much clutter and I won't be going back there either.

In fact I'm not sure if I am going anywhere in future. I can think of one or two places to visit but that will conclude my travels. After than I shall enjoy my Sundays like most people do.

For Remainers: Why the H of C Should Sit On Its Hands

I forget his name but a Tory strategist said he would have preferred a coalition, even a loose one, with the Liberal Democrats than rely on the Democratic Unionist Party with its cultural backwards stance.

Of course, it's hard luck. It could even be payback time, in the sense that the Tory reward for the Liberal Democrat prop from 2010 to 2015 was to massacre the Liberal Democrats in the pursuit of a majority. Had the Liberal Democrats been considered for such a coalition offer now and accepted, they would have lost my vote and a great many more forever. However, we know from Theresa May's past that her values, in so much as she has shown them, are more in keeping with the DUP than the Lib Dems.

It is time for Theresa May and the Conservatives to stew in their own juice. Theirs is the worst of all worlds now, because they have to continue to govern, but have lost authority to do it and will stagger on in weakness and with confusion of intentions.

I don't wish to be unkind to Labour, but the fact is that in conditions of a two party system the Labour Party has to be fantastically popular to win a majority. Whereas the Conservatives need about 317 to govern (no Sinn Fein plus usual DUP support), Labour needs 322. Labour also needs to get these seats in England, which is tougher for them than for the Tories.

Labour will get a majority if it holds and builds its support, gets the young out again (crucial), and yet sees a return to a three party system where the Liberal Democrats can take fed-up Tory voters. It will be the decay of the Tories and Liberal Democrats taking Tory votes that will let Labour in.

Now the Remain in the EU strategy WAS to wait for the negotiations to start to fail (cost, complication, arguing about lack of representation reducing sovereignty) and then persuade people to change their minds via a General Election or Referendum. The Tory factions either side would have undermined any result for negotiating, but the assumption was some result to withdraw.

Then Theresa May pulled a fast one, so that the Liberal Democrats failed to make traction (but also the leadership was rubbish). The prospect was that the remain side was stuffed by this clever General Election call by Theresa May's two advisors. Her majority would have overcome various Tory factions.

Now their/ her gamble has failed, the position is worse than ever. I am not a remainer seeking a soft exit; I am a remainer seeking to stay in the EU.

The strategy should now be different and work in two directions.

First is the argument that we could now be heading for the rights and costs of being in the EU - even in the single market and customs union - but we won't be able to affect policy. We therefore need to retain sovereignty by staying in, that is in the Council of Ministers, the European Parliament and providing personnel into the Commission. We argue that to leave the EU is to lose sovereignty, because others will make decisions without us. Staying in is the simplest and most cost-effective option.

Secondly, do not help the Tories. There is the idea that the House of Commons should be 'responsible' and 'constructive'. No it should not. Let the leavers and the turncoats (Remainers actively taking us out, like May) own the policy and carry it through. If they can. Let them and no one else pass The Great European Communities Repeal Bill

They do not possess the intellectual or person-power resources to do it. They are also politically tired: the body politic was not refreshed by this general election (as it usually is). They will have fifteen months of a lame duck leader and factions both sides working on this leave project.

The clock ticks to the point that Article 50 will be invoked. When that comes, it is a cliff edge. We will have to appeal to a unanimity of the twenty seven to stop the clock for a period. The 27, or one or more of them, may well decide that, yes, they will pause the clock but that the negotiations are so tiresome, so troublesome, so muddled, that the clock can only be stopped for good. There are more pressing things in the world.

In other words, the choice will be the cliff edge or staying in. And then the EU may offer a looser outer circle membership, a bit like Cameron wanted, that requires adjustment and little more. All the complications of extraction will be avoided. And then the people who voted to stay in, and some more, and who realise the benefits of sharing politically and economically with others, will be happy.

Meanwhile, do not underestimate UKIP and Farage. They will operate with a threat to take Tory votes again (from a low UKIP base where this works) but, more importantly, via Tory MPs of their persuasion. There will be UK Independence Tories. No problem. They will just add to the chaos in a House of Commons more sympathetic to a softer exit or none, and which will hopefully sit on its hands and watch the Tories sink in their own juices.

A General Election in two or three years will be one that finishes all this and we carry on as before, hopefully with a socially progressive Labour government or progressive alliance.

Propped Up for What Domestically?

A long time ago David Cameron had a wheeze. Because the SNP and Labour sent MPs from Scotland, and yet had a devolved Parliament, then on domestic legislation only English MPs should vote on domestic legislation at the critical committee revising stage with vetos. The same applies to things the Welsh do, and the things the Northern Irish do. The Speaker declares when legislation is only for English or English and Welsh MPs. Look up English Votes for English Laws (EVEL) for how it works.

Suddenly, times have changed. The Scottish Conservatives have bailed out Theresa May's English and Welsh disaster. But, hang on, when it comes to the NHS or social care and education, what exactly is Theresa May's majority? These cannot be used. Nor can any Northern Irish MPs.

It suggests that anything beyond The Budget and Foreign Affairs is going to come under an even further diminished minority.

Meanwhile, the whole point of a General Election is a refreshment of the body politic, either via a new government or its renewal with lots of changes to the cabinet.

Not this time. It carries on as if the government just had a short break. But something did happen. A majority of some seventeen or so in effect fell to a deficit of three. And what was going on anyway, quiet reference by the previous Prime Minister David Cameron to the Democratic Unionist Party, is made explicit. Did it have to be made explicit? Cameron was talking to the DUP anyway, but he didn't make a song and dance about it because of the needs of Ireland and their nasty social exclusion. But now, in another mistake, May makes explicit her dependence on them just as she seems to have returned to office as if nothing has happened.

DUP a Disaster & Govt. Cannot Get an EU Exit Deal

The closest parallel I think with recent politics now is with the John Major government in 1992. He had a majority that was weakened slowly through by-elections. It was economically incompetent. It ruined the railways. But for passing the Maastricht Treaty Major had a 'nuclear' option, a sort of Tory self-destruct. May does not have a nuclear button.

The first mistake is to rely on the Democratic Unionist Party. To hold Northern Ireland/ North of Ireland together needs the British government to be an honest broker without strategic interest in the province. To couple up with the DUP just in order to prop up a minority government is threatening a far bigger and delicate prize of long-term stability in the north. The DUP could have a shopping list in terms of the troubles memory and form of politics in the future that upsets the balance in Ireland.

The second mistake is to assume the government can have a 'stable' position regarding leaving the European Union. The problem for the EU side is that the negotiating partner in the British Government cannot deliver on its own deal.

Once again UKIP will be a very short tail wagging the Tory nutjob hard exit faction. So a deal that keeps the UK in the single market and customs union (that thus dissolves the border question in Ireland) will not satisfy these nutjobbers.

Yet a hard exit from the EU would not get past the vast majority of the House of Commons.

The clock is ticking and in two years the UK could fall out of the European Union. The Article 50 time limit and the cliff edge can only be prevented if all 27 in the EU agree - and the price may well be to stay in the European Union and no further 'time', no more Article 50, in order to prevent an economic disaster.

It is not clear either that a European Communities (Union?) Grand Repeal Act would get through and may be delayed until nearer an apparent deal.


The government, in other words, is heading for disaster, as it always was, but now doing so having lost political authority.

On anything else 318 or 319 is enough to run the House of Commons (the real majority line is 322 with the Irish abstentions) but always subject to Tory factions.

In the opposition Tim Farron should resign in favour of a more competent heavyweight and Jeremy Corbyn with authority but no power will be frustrated. It is quite possible after a time period to see a centre party realignment - the nearest to a grand coalition.

The Fixed Term Parliament Act should survive. The former prerogative is dead, and cannot be revived (otherwise monarchail prerogative is never removable and is superior to statute) so if the FTPA is repealed then some other democratic means to call a General Election is needed, not a Prime Minister who can dissolve a House of Commons as if the monarch did.

Intended to Vote Liberal Democrat

Late last night I decided to vote Liberal Democrat. Wasn't quite as certain as that, even then. However, I re-read the leaflets and there was enough in public services intentions for me to vote for the pro-EU party. I cannot vote even for a more competent team (Labour) to take us out of the European Union despite my annoyance that the Liberal Democrat manifesto on Europe is one for an opposition.

I came into a report on BBC 2 Newsnight that I followed up online to get it all. It was by Matthew Parris and was a biography of Theresa May. I said to my podiatrist today that I know he cannot talk politics or religion, but I can. I said this broadcast item went back to May's university years and throughout, including especially during the coalition government. It found that May has no vision, or no one knows what it may be. She does not 'form gangs' like politicians do. She faces people across the table, may say 'No' and follows with silence. It said too that she is, unlike most politicians, not transactional and "she cannot negotiate": she cannot make quick decisions.

Hang on. She cannot negotiate. This means that throughout this whole 'Powerpoint' (bullet points) election campaign we have been sold a pup. The media construction of Theresa May and all her robotic answers (her interview with Jon Snow earlier on Channel 4 News was her most robotic) hid the fact that she actually cannot negotiate.

I knew from the off it was all a lie, simply through the U turns and her absence of anything she believes in, other than presumably Tory privilege.

So when I went to the polling booth after podiatry I was going to vote Liberal Democrat. However, I allowed myself to look down the ballot paper. And then I was paused: not should I vote Labour or Liberal Democrat but should I vote Green? Labour never even featured in my consideration. No, I thought, I'll vote Liberal Democrat on the basis that someone has to hold them up when on the slide as they are, knowing that they will probably have to change leader and firm up their stance in favour of staying in the European Union.

I'm a Voting Uncertain

I was asked by a friend, why in a recent posting did I picture Theresa May in a "boob tube"? Do I fancy her ore something? No. Hardly, and not my intention! The picture is based on her wearing a dress at one of these lavish dinners she attended before adopting the mushroom-top hairstyle. I have added that recent hairy innovation and made the dress Tory blue. Presumably May adopted the Mushroom-bob to emphasise her willingness to press the nuclear button.

Beyond such utter trivia I approach this General Election in a condition of uncertainty. I said I firmed up towards the Liberal Democrats, but I am in a real dilemma.

It was Thursday last week that Jeremy Corbyn introduced his team to take us out of the European Union, and I said to myself that I cannot support a policy with a positive vote to take us out of the European Union.

The assumption here is that the Liberal Democrats would not take us out of the European Union, if forming the government. However, their manifesto is for opposition, having a 'destination referendum' at the end. And so it has to be said that one of the contenders for government will be removing us from the EU, with Labour at least offering the vague possibility of staying in at the end.

The argument is simple. Whatever we do, Europe is still there, and we will still have to obey trading rules. All we lose is the ability to shape those rules by removing from the political processes of decision making. We therefore lose not gain sovereignty.

However, I am impressed by the rest of the Labour programme and, having been a critic of Corbyn's ability to run his office, he has come on a bundle with the campaign. It is the manifesto that matters: all governments receive Civil Service support.

Corbyn himself responds and communicates, compared with the robotic May and the staccato Farron.

Farron is such a disappointment. He does not have a good wicket - the election argument he presents comes in nearly two years. But he is not much cop anyway. I would vote Liberal Democrat despite him, even despite the manifesto. The manifesto should say that a General Election trumps a referendum and a Liberal Democrat government would not take us out of the European Union. Instead, he has given the same sacred badge to an advisory referendum with a narrow vote to remove.

The Labour presentation is far more positive. This week unmediated coverage has shown Labour at its best, including on security. Corbyn is right to say resources for anti-terrorism must be under judicial review and preserving liberties. But then I am forced to vote for Karl Turner in East Hull. He did not reply to my correspondence. He has acted among MPs against Corbyn, and showed his own variability on such lack of principles. If I voted for him, I cannot know that I have voted positively for the Corbyn led government that will not suddenly have most of its MPs try and rebel including the sheepish Karl Turner, who follows the flock.

I think if I lived in West Hull and Hessle I would vote Labour. The candidate there is untested, and seems also non-Corbyn, but it is a Labour-Tory marginal and Labour (ex-Alan Johnson) is under threat. In East Hull, however, Turner sits on a pile and it allows me to vote first choice.

Trouble is, I do not know what my first choice is any more. I don't want to punish the Liberal Democrats twice for their part in the coalitition, as I did in 2015, but Farron has simply failed to make the case. In effect, two years only on, they are going to be punished twice. it's not clear they will even advance: they could lose seats. I hope they do not, and people in their Tory marginals support the Liberal Democrats despite Farron and the weak manifesto.

However, the positive thrust is with Labour at the national level. And it could be that I make my mind up staring at the ballot paper.

It is not a boob-tube but based on a dress she wore at one of these dinners before she changed her hairstyle to a mushroom. Presumably the mushroom bob is to reflect her commitment to hitting the nuclear button.