What interests Politically Homeless
Articles, videos and more that I have consumed this week
4th November 2024
I hope everyone had a lovely weekend. Here are some of the articles and videos I have been reading / watching this week.
Video: David Starkey talks through what has gone wrong with the Tories and the UK
Duration: 1 hour
David Starkey talks through all that has gone wrong with the Tories and the UK. He points out the sudden change in Robert Jenrick when he realised how broken the system was and how it was the problem and not the public. From there he chats about his thesis that the UK is now badly run because of the Blairite / Liberal revolution which has stripped power from politicians and given more and more of it to unelected and frankly incompetent bodies like the OBR, NHS England and more. I completely agree with him - it is imperative that we take an axe to them and return power to politicians and thus parliament who we the people can hold responsible.
Article: The IFS outlines the absolute collapse in productivity across the NHS
"Hospitals had 15.8% more consultants, 24.6% more junior doctors, 19.5% more nurses and health visitors, and 18.5% more clinical support staff in January to July 2023 than in January to July 2019."
A really interesting report produced in 2023 which outlines the problem of NHS productivity which has dropped off a cliff. Its authors are right insofar it is hard to measure productivity in certain circumstances and the impact of our broken care system. However they are also correct that the increase in staff numbers should have fed through into some sort of meaningful jump in treatments being completed but at the time of writing the system was barely meeting the number done in 2019 though I am sure it will have improved a bit since then. I am not seeing much from Labour to indicate they know what to do after 14 years in the wilderness
Read it here: IFS on the NHS productivity crisis
Article: Ray Massey in the Mail discusses the electric vehicle quotas
Massey outlines the next net zero catastrophe which the political class are about to visit on the country and themselves as quotas for the percentage of electric cars that must be sold increase again this coming year. To give you some background the current quotas are not being met but apparently the public is going to suddenly change their minds and buy even more next year. This is not going to happen and so I suspect you will start to see mounting public anger as the cost of internal combustion engine cars surge on the primary and secondary markets in response to the fines issued by Westminster. All this is before any car plant closures which are now being threatened. Our political class are really not very bright.
Read it here: Daily Mail on electric car quotas
Article: The UK is sitting on a mountain of coal
We are now starting to see the real world impacts of our elites obsession with net zero. This is showing up in very real ways for the working class who are having their jobs destroyed in places like Grangemouth and Port Talbot whilst having to deal with ever increasing energy prices at home. The debate is just starting and the policy is going to become ever more contested over this parliament. This article is fascinating (it is fully referenced) as shows that rather than running out of fossil fuels the UK especially is sitting on enough coal and gas to power the country for thousands of years. So by all means argue that we need to not use them - just don't say we don't have them
Read it here: Enough coal for centuries
Article: Spiked Online attacks the Reeves budget
Fraser Myers in Spiked Online rightly hammers the budget for doing nothing to break from the low growth status quo. Worse than that it actually embedded it further by bowing ever more to unelected QUANGO’s like the OBR and BOE which now have a strangle hold on economic policy in the UK. For me it just underlines that change will only come when we have politicians in charge who are willing to obliterate these organisation’s and agencies and take back the power to govern democratically rather than technocratically.
Read it here: Fraser Myers on the budget
Article: Juliet Samuel in the Times attacks the budget for failing on growth and public sector reform
Juliet lays out the truth in the first section - we have too little growth and a public sector which is too big for the state to sustain and yet the Reeves budget basically continues the status quo except for marginally higher investment over the parliament. In short every budget transfers money from the part of the economy where productivity is growing to the one where it is not which means growth slows even more. Even the £22 billion to the NHS was coughed up without any demands for reform or productivity enhancements - just more of the same with the ridiculous belief that this time will be different. Reeves just lobbed more money into the maw of the NHS but utterly refused to demand any reform.
Read it here: Juliet Samuel on the budget
Video: The Brendan O’Neill show with David Goodhart
Duration: 48 minutes
David is one of my favourite writers and thinkers and this video which covers his latest book shows why. He talks about the collapse of marriage and its impact on society as a whole. It is a subject which resonates with me as my parents divorced when I was 4 and though I had an amazing upbringing I have felt the impact ever since and none more so than when my boy was born 3 years ago. He goes into both the financial implications of having children and how we can and should do more to support people to stay at home if they want which might help couples to stay together. He also rightly flags that the British tax system is the only one in Europe if not the developed world which doesn’t recognise the family and how this warps financial outcomes - something Marie and I are very familiar with as directly impacted.
Article: Institute of Government reports on Civil service numbers
Post Brexit I expected numbers to grow as functions were returned to the UK from Brussels. However I continue to be confused over exactly what they are doing as consecutive governments have farmed out more and more functions to QUANGO’s and other bodies. This leaves me asking the question what the hell are 500,000 people doing across the country. How can we have this amount of civil servants governing the country and it still be so badly run. It underlines for me that the state is structurally no longer functional and needs radical reform - using a chainsaw.
Read it here: IfG on Civil Service numbers over recent years
Video: Trevor Phillips talks to Spectator TV about the latest report from the Policy Exchange about integration and race in the UK
Duration: 40 minutes
Phillips discusses how the report cuts through most of the nonsense which is currently pushed by our elites about white privilege and institutional racism. But also how the in many cases emergent communities can now live in the UK and not even have to engage with the host culture. Largely it is a call to arms for a better debate about how how we got here and what we should do moving forward. As someone who is increasingly worried about the direction of race relations in the UK I welcome the report as a way to encourage a more open discussion. This is especially vital with Labour actively trying to close down any discussion and attack anyone who even wants to talk about race and migration.
Article: The Guardian on how the National Trust fought back against the culture warriors
An interesting article which shows how the culture war has engulfed the National Trust. You can read the ins and outs in the article but for me the key parts are Restore Trust talking about what they think the members want:
“I think most people want the National Trust to be a completely politically free space. They go to its properties for leisure, recuperation and solace, and they expect the National Trust to be a custodian of some of our most important places. They did not expect it to proselytise or advance a particular cultural or political view.”
And also when the CEO lets the cat out of the bag on the internal tensions within the Trust. I don’t actually believe these numbers - this looks like an assumption based upon a loud progressive minority.
“I would say 70% of my staff and volunteers would be regarded as progressive activists so I have a workforce of people who are really wanting to push on this,” she said, referring to issues the trust campaigns on and contrasting these with its membership base.”
Either way the Trust will find itself in the crosshairs now as the culture war will be fought by the Tories or Reform will supplant them.
Read it here: Guardian on the National Trust culture war
Video: Productivity expert chats about how he does it
Duration: 1 hour 5 minutes
I love writing, reading and creating but I always struggle with time what with a full time job, wife and 3 year old son. So I absolutely love videos like this that give me little hints on how to still get things done with even a limited diary. I especially like the idea that tasks will expand to take up any time you allow them so compression and acceptance of "good enough" is key.
From Twitter: The history of the English countryside
One of those threads that I love Twitter for - a little potted history of how the UK countryside has been shaped by man for thousands of years.
See it here: How the English countryside evolved
Picture of the week: This made me chuckle as it perfectly captures how millions of Americans feel about the current economy
That is everything for this week
Enjoy your week y’all - don’t forget to leave feedback and also share if you like