“How’s running the world?”, Sir Kenneth Calman asked me with a warm handshake just before I collected my MA. I told him to tell me. (Funnily enough, I have still yet to meet his successor, whose parents are friends of mine.)
The obvious question is the killer one: why would you want any more fiscal power when you don’t even use the one that you already have?
I don't understand. Surely Sir Kenneth wasn't referring to your piddling little antics with the BPA or whatever it was at the time?
ReplyDelete"I don't understand"
ReplyDeleteYou've got that right, dear...
Really? Sir Kenneth Calman was aware of your activities, to such an extent that he considered you "running the world" (even with, I accept, a little hyperbole)
ReplyDeleteAnd yet, since then - a few years ago - you don't seem to have made much progress. Little embarrassing, wouldn't you say?
For the second time in as many days David's mask is slipping. For all the man of the people/tribune of the provinces bollocks he is extremely well-connected. Far more than the critics he dismisses as the political class or the liberal elite or that sort of thing.
ReplyDeleteDabble, "I don't understand" - You've got that right, dear...
ReplyDeleteAnonymous, please do not swear on my blog.
David is one of Durham University's most favoured sons Dabble. Allowed to behave in absolutely any way he likes and still revered (there is no other word for it) by the people who really matter. In the end his enemies just make peace. Allegedly far more senior they never get anything like the back up that he does. I have checked and the Chancllor (not the Vice-Chanellor) is David'd friend on Facebook FFS!
ReplyDeleteThe VC is probably waiting to be granted an audience with the great man.
ReplyDeleteHe is like that with the Labour Party in the old Derwentside and the NW Durham constituency too. He has been expelled from Labour and stood against them yet he is still a consigliere. Anyone associated with Kevan Jones, a minister in a Labour government, is a pariah. But David Lindsay is The Man.
ReplyDeleteOne of the most senior Labour figures in Co Durham recent took him along to a civic service in the Cathedral. At the reception afterwards he was greeted as an old friend and future standard bearer. Because he is. They know that he is standing for Parliament as an Independent.
At least one MP was at the service but none was deemed important enough for the reception.
He has plenty of friends in the BBC.
ReplyDeleteEnough, Enough, Enough!
ReplyDeleteComments on the Calman Report only, please.
Philip Blond was on Start The Week today. Hugely influential. Member of the Facebook David Lindsay Appreciation Society. People whose articles appear on Comment is Free/Coffee House/the Telegraph blog etc casually call David by his first name when replying to his comments. I've never seen them do that for anyone else.
ReplyDeleteI said, enough. Comments on the Calman Report only, please.
ReplyDeleteWow, you guys all know each other.
ReplyDeleteI guess England is like that.
I have it on very good authority that David's blog is read and taken seriously by all the think tanks you've ever heard of, as well as by senior civil servants and shadow ministers (I don't know if ministers read it, but it wouldn't surprise me).
ReplyDeleteI don't expect David to post this, as it's off-topic and he is always rigorous about deleting comments that don't stick to the subject of the post, but there you go.
David comes off the most distinguihsed family in St. Helena so it is no surprise that he has slid effortlessly into the establishment in Co. Durham and Durham University.
ReplyDeleteA consigliere, that's the most accurate description of him I have ever heard.
ReplyDeleteThe MP at the cathedral service but not grand enough for the reception was Hilary Armstrong. Lindsay was sitting right behind her. Funny I know. But the real point is that at a civic service in Durham Cathedral David Lindsay was given the seat right behind Hilary Armstrong.
I am closing this thread.
ReplyDelete