We’ll move on if you tackle big problems
JUBILEE LINE-UP SHOULD HAVE BEEN SO MUCH BETTER
I WATCHED much of the Jubilee celebrations on TV and enjoyed the majority of it. However, even if I had not been at the Jeff Beck concert on Saturday night I wouldn’t have watched the Jubilee concert.
Whoever compiled that line-up did it to please themselves, not the Queen.
The artists appearing should have been from each decade of the Queen’s reign, creating nostalgia for her.
Marty Wilde still performs and he could have represented the 50s.
For the 60s they could have asked Tom Jones and Lulu or Paul McCartney, who sent the Queen a message.
The 70s were covered by Elton John, Rod Stewart and Queen. Duran Duran could have been aided and abetted by The Human League and Kim Wilde as a nod to the 80s.
If the Spice Girls couldn’t be tempted or a Gallagher brother felt too risky for the 90s then Heather Small could have sung M People classics together with our very own soul diva Beverley Knight singing her early hits.
I could have named more from some decades but the above will suffice to make my point.
All the above artists are British and we are celebrating the reign of our Queen and the music that accompanied her life.
A missed opportunity.
I THINK we should try to allow people who have done wrong to repent and do right; we should let them move on – though move means action not just vapid cheap words.
So I look forward to the prime minister moving on. But not away from the scene of his crimes and embarrassments – rather moving on to tackle the big problems that are likely to require painful and sacrificial action, more so due to the cowardly procrastination when things were easier and short-termists didn’t nip them in the bud.
Leaving aside tackling tax-dodging, one example that will save us all money immediately and sustainably in the long term is a radical programme of energy conservation – both by demanding that all new construction is to the highest standards from day one and also retrofitting, necessary for old buildings.
Like his hero Winston Churchill he should be straight with people, leading when sacrifices have to be made, even to the extent of renouncing the cult of year-on-year growth – does more stuff really make us more equal, happy and stable as finite resources are exhausted to satisfy the privileged few?
It’s said that the primary role of government is to protect people.
This doesn’t just mean from the threat of military aggressors like Vladimir Putin, it also means from economic attack and dictation by the likes of China, pharmaceutical corporations sitting on patents letting millions suffer and die and plutocrats dictating a world-view that isn’t environment or peoplecentred.
So I’ll give the PM and his party a chance – let him ‘move on,’ but more betrayal and failure of Conservatives to conserve our world and people’s future will only condemn him and them as not only the ‘Nasty Party,’ but also as the morally bankrupt.
Conservatives worthy of the name know what needs doing.
Aletheia Judge BACK-OF-A-FAG-PACKET PLANS WON’T STOP THE DECLINE
BORIS Johnson and his supporters may think ‘going Thatcher’ is the way out of a hole but in reality it isn’t.
When you take away the scores of bagcarriers, flunkies, and gofers on the government pay-roll dependent on his patronage, one sees that Conservative backbenchers mostly want shot of him.
The back-of-a-fag-packet razzamatazz about extending home ownership shows how out of touch he is – people simply don’t have the deposits. And a desperate housing shortage, hidden by people living with friends and family, isn’t going to be helped by social housing being sold to those with the cash – buy-to-rent landlords.
Do poor people really want negative-equity when the boom crashes?
Time and again we see so-called ‘affordable housing’ projects devouring scarce land passed by acquiescent councils.
These are questionably affordable for ‘dinky’ professionals – not those in need. But perhaps we shouldn’t worry too much, there will be another wonder announcement trumpeted tomorrow.
Perhaps it will be police drones to scoop up crooks and convey them straight to prison, or paramedic drones whisking cancer-sufferers past delays to 24/7 virtual-operating oncologist teams on the other side of the world efficiently controlling robot surgeons, nurses and ancillary staff.
The government may be trying to get the initiative back, but are Labour, Lib Dems, Greens and others (including responsible Tories) prepared to work together for the greater good?
If they don’t they can’t expect support or to turn things around, bearing in mind our compromised system where money indirectly buys its way.