Dearth

Of course Britain is in recession. When were we truly last not? Perhaps on the day of the 2010 General Election? But the memory of one was still fresh enough, as it had been far longer after the event in 1997. With no term limits, and being practically impregnable, Britain only ever changes its Government because of an economic crisis, even one that was over by the time that the Election came round.

Not that that will be the case next year. Unlike in 1997 or 2010, it will not be that the Government had solved the problem that had initially brought it to office, and presided over fat years, but then found that the lean ones had returned, as they do if you do not understand the money supply, or if you find it politically expedient to affect such ignorance. Since 2010, there have been no fat years, not even for the people and places, the same people and places in both cases, that had experienced them under Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair.

Yet what are even those people and places, never mind the rest of us, offered instead? Quite explicitly, no change. None. That is considered to be the Opposition's selling point. But when I tell you that there is going to be a hung Parliament, then you can take that to the bank. I spent the 2005 Parliament saying that it was psephologically impossible for the Heir to Blair's Conservative Party to win an overall majority. I predicted a hung Parliament on the day that the 2017 General Election was called, and I stuck to that, entirely alone, all the way up to the publication of the exit poll eight long weeks later. And on the day that Rishi Sunak became Prime Minister, I predicted that a General Election between him and Keir Starmer would result in a hung Parliament. By the way, here is the original of the photograph that Starmer used for his Christmas tweet.

And here is what he turned it into, complete with AI hands the size of his head. What a ridiculous little man he is.

To strengthen families and communities by securing economic equality and international peace through the democratic political control of the means to those ends, including national and parliamentary sovereignty, we need to hold the balance of power. Owing nothing to either main party, we must be open to the better offer. There does, however, need to be a better offer. Not a lesser evil, which in any case the Labour Party is not.