Monday
Shortly after being sworn in as the new MP for Rochdale – his fourth different constituency after Glasgow Hillhead, Bethnal Green and Bradford – George Galloway announced he would be giving a press conference outside parliament. It being a relatively slow news day and George being renowned for making his own, a sizeable number of the lobby showed up. Even by Westminster standards, Galloway is a narcissist supreme. Vain and prone to megalomania, he professed himself to be delighted by the turnout before being rude to almost everyone who asked a question. The BBC man was “dripping with imperial condescension”; GB News was passed over for having said something disobliging.
And so it went on, though Gorgeous George would have been gutted if we had all wandered off after a couple of minutes. His election had prompted an extraordinary intervention from Rishi Sunak the previous Friday, when he made an impromptu early evening statement outside Downing Street in which he warned that democracy was threatened by extremists, the country was falling apart and something needed to be done. He seemed to forget he was meant to be running the country and his party had done more than its fair share in stirring up hatred. But he also seemed to be missing the point. Galloway’s election showed democracy was alive and well.
It was Labour’s cock-up that meant voters didn’t get their first choice and George sneaked in. He may speak well but he is not a serious politician. His first loyalty is always to his own ego. I got a lot of flak online for suggesting this before. His supporters seemed to imply that any criticism of him was somehow to condone the killings in Gaza. Far from it. Just that some of us remember the people and regimes to which he has cosied up. At various times he has been a Putin apologist and a friend to Saddam Hussein and Iran. Worst of all, he also became a cat on Big Brother.
Tuesday
So … more than two weeks since I had my pointless afternoon at the fracture clinic and well over a month since I went to A&E, my shoulder is still completely knackered after my fall outside White Hart Lane. There are days when it seems to be improving slightly only for it to then go back to square one. I’m not completely debilitated as I can still work, but I am in constant pain – far more so than after my knee replacement – and even grumpier than usual. And there are few signs that anyone is interested in me getting better.
On the plus side, I have been given another date at the fracture clinic later this month, where I fully expect the consultant to be surprised to see me again. Very possibly he will look at my notes and say: “You haven’t yet had an ultrasound.” And I will agree that I haven’t, because despite being told that was the next step the last time I attended the hospital, I have yet to receive a letter or text offering me an appointment. So there will be a pause, another note will be made on the hospital records for someone to have another go at organising an ultrasound, and I will at some point get another appointment for the fracture clinic at which the same dance will be repeated.
Virtually everyone I know, including those who are ideologically committed to the NHS, have suggested that I go private and pay for my own ultrasound and any subsequent treatment required. Having already invested so much time in my treatment, I have been reluctant to do this. Call it the sunk cost fallacy.
But I’m beginning to come round to it. Partly because my principles clearly aren’t iron clad – I have a private dentist – but also because I have come round to the idea that going private is precisely what the NHS wants me to do. The system is at breaking point and they just don’t have the capacity to cope with a 67-year-old man with a crocked shoulder. I am no one’s priority. And if I wait it out, it would merely show I wasn’t even my own priority.
Wednesday
I have now sat in the press gallery for more than 20 budgets or autumn statements. Most memorably, Kwasi Kwarteng’s successful attempt to crash the economy. But things have changed a lot in 10 years. Back in 2014 the media made a big deal of relatively small fiscal changes. Chancellors talked a big game but were relatively conservative in their actions. To change the rate of income tax by 1% was seismic.
Things are very different now. Big fiscal events have become normalised, so we have all become a bit blase about it. Today’s budget was most notable, however, for every change having been pre-briefed to the media. There were no surprises whatsoever. Normally a chancellor has one so-called rabbit up his sleeve with which he hopes to blindside the opposition and thrill his own backbenchers.
To make matters worse, Jeremy Hunt is not the sharpest economic mind on the block – being slightly brighter than his technically braindead No 2 at the Treasury, Laura Trott, is not a great selling point – and his delivery was dismal. As if even he didn’t really believe in what he was saying. Then, maybe he just didn’t understand it.
That might excuse the 80 minutes he was on his feet. Because in that time, Jezza said almost nothing that wasn’t false. There are far greater truths to be found in fiction. He began by saying this was a budget for growth. He forgot he had said that last time and that we are now in a recession. He said debt was falling. It wasn’t. He said he was reducing taxes. They were rising to their highest level since 1948. It was as though he was describing a different country to the one we all know exists.
Within minutes, you could see the despair on the faces of Tory MPs. This was their last throw of the dice before an election and they had lost. Things aren’t going to get better. If this was an election budget, the game is up.
Thursday
There have been several articles recently lamenting the lack of late-night bars and clubs in London. Apparently it is now a huge struggle to find somewhere open after midnight, a state of affairs that has led to some declaring that London is no longer a serious city. In which case, can someone please explain to me how these things work.
Who are all these people who find themselves at a loose end and reckon their night out is ruined if there are only a few places open where they can drop another £100 on some over-priced cocktails and stagger home at four in the morning? What drugs are they on? How does this even work? Or more precisely, how do they even work? Stumbling into the office with a hangover after three hours’ sleep. And if they don’t work, how the hell do they afford to go out night after night?
What’s so bad about calling it quits at 11.30pm? Or is there a secret London? A London that exists in a parallel universe that is the mirror image of normal life. Where people get up at 8pm and go to bed when everyone else is getting up. OK, I admit that I am almost certainly not the target market for an all-night shebeen. Far too old, far too boring.
But even when I was in my 20s nobody went out much. Staying up late meant hanging around a mate’s place smoking dope and either watching TV or playing records. From time to time we’d do some speed and head off to the South Bank to skateboard in the middle of the night. And if we still weren’t ready to head home, we’d either go to Up All Night on the Fulham Road for a burger or the greasy spoon at Victoria station. Those were just about the only places open. Certainly on a student’s budget.
Friday
Barring any last-minute relapses, tomorrow will be the 37th anniversary of my getting clean. No drugs, no alcohol. I call that a result. I had no idea what I was doing really when the 30-year-old me walked through the entrance of the rehab centre on the morning of 9 March 1987. I had even brought a cassette player and some tapes with me because I imagined I might get bored.
Those tapes never got played. The cold turkey was hell. I have still never forgotten it. Ten days of almost no sleep, shitting and vomiting while the counsellors tried to coerce me in group therapy. But I had one thing going for me. I knew I had hit rock bottom. That I had no more using left in me. I was overdosing at least once a week and I knew that if I didn’t stop I would be dead within a year. And for the first time in years, I cared more about living than I did about dying. So I stuck it out.
After leaving rehab, I went to Narcotics Anonymous meetings where it took me ages to say a word. My brain was still too scrambled to take charge of my thoughts and construct coherent sentences. Family, friends and fellow recovering addicts looked after me when I couldn’t look after myself. I owe them my life. Many of them are now dead. Addiction is attritional. Relapse, suicide, Aids, hepatitis C, cancer and heart disease have taken their toll. There has been a far higher incidence of serious illness in recovering addicts than in other friends. But those who survive, I love dearly.
It hasn’t been easy. No one becomes an addict because they are well. I have struggled with depression and mental illness; twice been admitted to a psychiatric hospital. But I have plodded on, a day at a time. Because what else am I going to do? I have never had a plan. Other than not using. I only became a writer because a friend was a writer and it seemed there was a possibility of a freelance career without having to explain a 10-year gap on my CV. So here I am. Somehow I have built a life. A beautiful wife, two wonderful children and a gorgeous dog. I am a lucky man.
