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Tel’s Tales, June / July 2023
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ALASTAIR, PRETTY ACCURATELY SUMS UP THE THE 2019 GENERAL ELECTION
“The LibDems (believed) they were on the verge of electoral triumph, so fell into the trap the Tories were laying for sale a “Get Brexit done” early election. The Scottish Nationalists, who had more realistic prospects of doing well in a general election, fell even more willingly into the trap. Labour had no option but to go along with it, and give Johnson the gift he wanted… I believe Keir Starmer, can and should (reopen the Brexit argument)”.
Alistair Campbell, The Guardian.
SECRET OWNERSHIP OF UK PROPERTY USING OFFSHORE SHELL COMPANIES
Laws requiring beneficial ownership of such companies to be disclosed have recently come into force – the Russian invasion of Ukraine was the driving force behind the laws. But a BBC investigation ”estimated that ultimate ownership of around 50,000 properties via 18,000 Shell companies remained hidden. Around 11,000 of these companies had not provided any detail at all and others had hidden ownership behind further layers of offshore secrecy”.
Private Eye
THE GUARDIAN SPELLS IT OUT
“Sir Keir has had 12 slogans since becoming leader, each one more meaningless than the last…The mistake has been a lack of what Americans call ‘the vision thing’. No-one knows what Sir Keir or his party clearly stands for – apart from attacking its left flank. Labour’s strongest cards are on the NHS, public services and inequality. Yet there is no coherent strategy that plays to those strengths. Unfortunately, presently Labour appears uninterested in transforming the country… If the Labour party wants to stick to fiscal orthodoxy, then then why won’t it tax capital gains effectively to to pay for decent public services? The question is met with silence from the leadership…
Sir Keir’s policies are distinguished by their lack of ambition and are dwarfed by the problems they seek to solve… Sir Keir ought to be bolder in his prescriptions to fix Britain. For that he will need a diagnosis of what ails the country. Such an insight would act as a signpost for the public”.
The Guardian, Editorial
ONCE IT WAS ‘BUTSKELLISM’, NOW IT’S ‘REEVUNTISM’
“In the 1950s, a term was coined to describe the political consensus; Rab Butler for the Tories and Hugh Gaistskell for Labour – it became known as Butskellism. Butskellism has returned. On the big issues not much separates the Tories and Labour, with both parties shifting towards the centre. For want of a better word, let’s call it ‘Reevuntism’ in honour if Shadow Chancellor, Rachel Reeves and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt”.
Larry Elliot, The Guardian.
STATE SCHOOLS PENALISED BY TOUGHER EXAMS
Pupils in state schools have to sit GCSEs that are 100% exams. But in private schools they sit “international” GCSEs where, in subjects such as English and history, up to 50% of the mark can come from coursework, which of course is much less stressful and “easier”. By 2013, state schools had caught on to what the private schools were up to. Entries for “international” GCSE for English, for example, had rocketed from 18,000 to 78,000.
But in 2015 Michael Gove, the Tory Education Minister, ruled that state school pupils could only take the more vigorous GCSEs and not the “international” version. Thus a two-tier education system was created, to the disadvantage of state school pupils.
WHY THE “GREEN BELT” IS SO VITAL
“Few people are taking the fact of the disappearance of much of our insect and wildlife seriously…In articles and letters, people want developers and government to build on in the green belt. However, this is ecological emergency and there are alternatives: brownfield sites, empty houses and it is possible to build low-rise in the cities and towns. But no one is interested, least of all the Labour party, which is more conservative on the issue than Michael Gove.”
Stephen Dorril, The Observer.
INSIGHT INTO THE APPALLING WAY GREECE WAS TREATED BY IT’S INTERNATIONAL LENDERS.
- In return for bailouts a very draconian regime of spending controls was imposed by the international lenders.
- “Greece’s economy shrank by 25% – a downturn as severe as the Great Depression in the US in the 1930s. By 2014 disposable household income had sunk below 2003 levels. Between 2008 and 2013 Greeks became, on average, 40% poorer. In 2015 one in five Greeks were assessed as experiencing severe material deprivation – almost 4 million people were “at risk of poverty or social exclusion”.
- Unemployment peaked at 27.5%. It was an appalling 58% for those aged under 25.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE HAS “INEXPLICABLE ACTIONS”
“Everyone is in a ferment about how ChatGPT and similar bots will change the world…. But no one, including the companies building the systems, truly understands how these AI models work. They have begun to exhibit ’emergent properties’ – industry parlance for inexplicable actions, which is cause for serious concern”.
Danny Fortson, commentator for The Sunday Times, based in Silicon Valley.