Even the EU knows culture by fiat doesn’t work

What a palaver. The EU has decided it is banning British cities from participating in a pointless Brussels vanity project known as the Capitals of Culture programme, prompting an outbreak of anguish across the political spectrum.

This snub was all the fault of the “Tory Brexit”, carped the SNP’S Chris Law. Joe Anderson, the Labour mayor of former Capital of Culture Liverpool, declared it to be “a tragedy”. With his customary gravitas, Labour’s Tom Watson warned: “The Government must now explain how they intend to ensure that Brexit does not leave us culturally isolated from Europe.” And the Brexiteer campaign group Leave.eu labelled the EU’S decision “pathetically childish”.

Lest anyone think the Government wasn’t taking this very seriously indeed, No 10 said it had convened “urgent discussions” about it with EU officials.

Not all readers will be familiar with the EU’S Capitals of Culture scheme, founded in 1985, so I’ll explain. Each year, a group of culture vultures and bureaucrats in Brussels sift through bids from dozens of European cities and choose one whose cultural assets they deem to have been overlooked. The EU provides a little bit of funding and some PR and then the city itself goes on a massive spending splurge to put on cultural events and boost its tourism numbers. As you might expect from a large tourism-focused stimulus, this spending often generates a strong rise in visitor numbers, hotel bookings and the like. This is then touted as a massive endorsement for the programme.

The main point of the scheme, the EU says, is to “increase European citizens’ sense of belonging to a common cultural area”. It is hardly surprising that the EU has decided to exclude Britain, though it’s petty to do it after several cities have already spent up to £500,000 on their bids.

Before reacting, however, read what the EU’S impact assessment of its own programme had to say in 2013: “There is limited evidence of longterm benefits… linked to the [Capital of Culture] hosting process.” And there is “a significant absence of evidence of direct effects more than three years after the event”. The only “tragedy” here is that so many people seem to think that a group of self-appointed luvvies can create culture by fiat.

The doorbell went. “I’m just here to check the meter,” said the lady. She seemed nice enough and I let her in. Big mistake.

Not long afterwards, a letter arrived. We were on holiday, and it wasn’t until several weeks later that it emerged from the mountain of post. It was a courtesy notice from British Gas informing us that our bill was about to rise – by a factor of nine.

Now, staying on top of household admin is not my strong suit, but even

I knew that this required action. One month’s direct debit had already gone out. All British Gas had to do was sit there and start raking in thousands of pounds from our bank account.

So, after years of lethargy, we finally switched. The new supplier’s estimated bill is three times less – and it includes electricity.

This week, Centrica, the owner of British Gas, published its financial results and I realised we were part of a mass movement. Centrica lost nearly 387,000 customers in the first half of this year and, since June, the rate of customer flight has doubled, with 823,000 people closing their accounts.

It’s about time. We Brits love to moan about everything, while doing nothing to help ourselves. The country’s big energy suppliers are an easy target for bile and price caps are now all the rage in political circles.

You’d never know it from all the carping, but British households actually enjoy some of the lowest consumer gas prices in western Europe. Yet we still seem to think it’s the government’s job to ensure we are running our own households efficiently by legislating us on to lower tariffs when it takes all of 10 minutes online to switch for yourself.

So remember: if big energy companies are treating their customers like chumps, it’s probably because we’re acting like chumps. One of the political contortions brought about by Brexit is that it has prompted some unusual characters to flock to the defence of our finance industry. Jeremy Corbyn has never been much of a fan of banking or trade, so it was a surprise to hear him haranguing the Prime Minister this week over David Davis’s inability to protect the City of London from the consequences of leaving the EU. “He cannot even guarantee that banks will have a right to trade with Europe,” the Labour leader said, amid a list of grievances.

It would have been most illuminating to hear Mr Corbyn explain why exactly he thinks those awful banks, which he denounces at every other opportunity, should be able to trade freely with the continent. Perhaps next time.

A couple of weeks ago, I mused on techniques for ridding hands of the awful smell from chopping onions or garlic for cooking. A kind reader, Pamela Wheeler, wrote a letter suggesting that rinsing one’s hands in cold water before starting work can help by closing the pores before they get soaked in the offending juices. This lessens the smell, but it doesn’t get rid of it completely. I’m still looking for a silver bullet.