The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Priti longing to shop locally
It was Keynes (Maynard, not Milton) who reckoned that one of the main points (and downsides) of unbridled capitalism was that it encouraged people to buy lots of things they don’t need or really want. In our changed world, much is now being made of encouraging us all not to buy anything new for a month. Miles ahead of you there. Apart from food and drink, I haven’t bought anything new for about six months, apart from having to replace household appliances that have finally given up the ghost.
Our collective circumstances may be highly charged but our spending activity shouldn’t be. Unless, that is, we follow government thinking that we must all spend our way out of the Slough of Despond into which coronavirus has cast the economy and it’s our own fault if it tanks and takes us all with it.
Then again, a day is a long time in Covid land.
One moment we are supposed to be eating out and shopping our way to safety/recovery and the next, it’s back in the hoose again and get your head down over that computer, that working from home shtick won’t manage itself, you know.
Still, I suppose it’s better than being hit with the household “rule of six” (which sounds like a cross between a Sherlock Holmes mystery and a bad Enid Blyton) while packs of idiots can gather and go grouse shooting and hunting to their heart’s content. The only grouse with which I have any connection, not to say fellow-feeling, is the Famous stuff that comes in bottles, so you might think I have a bit of an agenda here…
Anyway, it’s a different kind of shopping that’s beginning to loom large for many of us, spearheaded by that model of restraint and quiet reason, Home Secretary Priti Patel, and her assurance that she will cheerfully dob in anyone in her vicinity whom she sees whooping it up in these times of strife and rule bending. So much for love thy neighbour as thyself though Nicola Sturgeon’s stolen a march by banning any indoor inter-household contact at all.
Of course, none of the increasing ranks of entitled narcissists could possibly love anyone, let alone their beleaguered neighbours, as much as themselves. But it might get a few somewhat hollow laughs. I look forward to Ms Patel’s appearance as a witness for the prosecution against Dominic Cummings but I won’t hang by the neck waiting for it to happen.
Then, at the same end of the credibility spectrum, we are confronted with Dame Dido Harding, the female equivalent of Chris “Failing” Grayling in being handed jobs she can’t do, including, any day now, taking charge of public health.
At least he managed to get himself elected which is more than she’s ever done. I have no idea if the vicious rumour that she recently locked herself out of her own swish London pad after forgetting her keys is true but if it’s not, it’s the best piece of fake news I’ve heard in many a long, locked down day.
It is topped only by the news that the ham-fisted bodyguard of Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab left a loaded gun on a plane.
At least the culprit has been suspended which is more than you can say for many other people who are currently making a cods of the day job.
“The only grouse with which I have any connection is the Famous stuff that comes in bottles
Members of the Tory Party, it must be said, do have previous on this. Earlier this year, a bodyguard assigned to ex-PM David Cameron left his weapon of choice in an aeroplane toilet. One can, if one is being charitable, actually see how that might happen and it’s nothing to do (one devoutly hopes) with the Mile High Club. One just has to ponder the fact that there must, in the current political climate, be more than a few smoking guns swishing around the House of Commons, just waiting to be discovered by some hapless functionary in search of a definite decision, a policy that makes sense or the logical arguments of Michael Gove.
It was also Mr Cameron, you may recall, who managed to leave his then eight-year-old daughter Nancy in the pub. Of course, hostelries were open at the time which probably explains it.
Couldn’t happen now? Don’t bet your furlough money on it. It’s surely only a matter of time before Boris Johnson does the same, as he has a rather more fluid approach to family life than his predecessor-but-one who seems to lead a fairly blameless domestic existence.
At least Cameron seemed to know exactly how many children he has, even if he was somewhat carelessly prone to mislaying them occasionally.
And it is doubly likely to occur in Mr Johnson’s case, as we are now led to believe that he is too strapped for cash to afford a nanny.
Well, you just can’t get the staff, Boris, as we all know when we look at those we have elected to do the job of running the country on our behalf.
For once, we truly are all in this together.