Monday
The seventh anniversary of the EU referendum passed almost unnoticed. Which seems something of an oversight. You’d have thought Rishi Sunak at least would have been keen to mark the occasion. Either by telling us all the benefits we’ve accrued in the interim or explaining when they are due to arrive. After all, he had always been one of the true believers who had embraced Brexit right from the start. Surely he can’t have changed his mind. But no. Sunak has been almost entirely silent on the subject. These days you will almost never hear the word Brexit” pass his lips. Not even when he’s talking about inflation.
Sunak is always happy to mention the war in Ukraine and Covid as reasons for the UK’s spiralling price increases but he seems to have taken a vow of silence on Brexit. Almost as if he is hoping everyone forgets all about it. Even more remarkably, Labour seems equally reluctant to raise the possibility of Brexit being in some way responsible for the UK lagging behind other G7 economies. Keir Starmer is now so terrified of being labelled a remainer – to be fair there are few votes to be had in telling the electorate they made a big mistake in the EU referendum – that he, too, is prepared to ignore the Brexit dividend of a 4% hit to GDP.
So we now have the strange situation where the two largest political parties can no longer talk about a seismic economic and political event. One person who did mark the anniversary, however, was Boris Johnson. He tweeted that it had been an unmitigated success because the UK had been able to roll out the Covid vaccine ahead of the EU. He’s said this before, of course, and it was a lie then as well. There was nothing to stop the UK rolling out the vaccine early, even if we had still been in the EU. But it was good to see Johnson remaining resolutely on brand. Lying is his USP.
Tuesday
The Co-op’s funeral care division has just published its new Top 10 of most requested songs to be played at people’s final curtain. A subject that is increasingly on my mind. No one is ever going to now say of me that I died young. Younger than I would have liked, maybe, but not young. Top of the Co-op list is Time to Say Goodbye by Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman, a song I can honestly say I have never heard of. Perhaps I am now too old to die fashionably. My Way is in at No 2 – surely the song of choice for all those who can’t be bothered to give their funeral much thought – and then Supermarket Flowers by Ed Sheeran. Another song I’ve never heard of before.
Is it just me, or are people dying younger these days? Or is every funeral playlist left to relatives in their 20s? Also back in favour are two hymns, All Things Bright and Beautiful – who would want something that twee? – and Abide With Me. Out of the Top 10 goes Monty Python’s Always Look on the Bright Side of Life. Which is fine by me. I loved it in the film but I don’t want it at my funeral. The time for comedy is during the speeches by friends and family. The music is for the tears. Which is why I have already chosen my own playlist. Just two songs. The first is Morgen by Richard Strauss. The soaring soprano and violin get me every time. The second is Leonard Cohen’s If It Be Your Will. Though not the studio version with Lenny singing but the Live version sung by the Webb Sisters. I was lucky enough to be at the O2 to hear it in person and time seemed to stand still. Just sublime. If everyone in the crematorium isn’t in floods of tears after those two, then they have hearts of stone.
Wednesday
Given the choice, I’d have spent today at Lord’s for the second Test match against Australia. Come to think of it, I’d have happily spent Thursday and Friday there, too. But sadly I am far too disorganised to remember to secure tickets six months in advance when booking opens, too friendless to know anyone with a spare ticket, and not well connected enough to be offered corporate hospitality. So instead I will be at work, following the action on the Guardian’s over-by-over live blog. Which is pretty much how I have followed every Test match for years now.
I went to my first Test – England v Pakistan – at the Oval in 1967 and have been to countless games since. But none recently. My mistake. I would like nothing more than to see this England cricket team go head to head with Australia. Because the new brand of attacking cricket – AKA Bazball – has not only transformed the way England approach the five-day game, it has also changed the way I watch it. Some of the fearlessness has rubbed off on me. Tight matches always used to leave me a nervous wreck. Sometimes, so much so that I actually had to leave the room if I was watching on television and come back when the game was over. I literally could not bear to watch. I cared too much.
But I realised during the first Test at Edgbaston last week that something had shifted within me. Obviously I wanted England to win, but I was curiously relaxed about them losing. I wasn’t bothered about the 50 runs we might have scored in the first innings that would have ensured at least a draw. I was on the same wavelength as the team. Better to risk all in the pursuit of victory than play safe. So as Australia closed in on victory, I felt a sense of calm. And when we lost, it did not hurt too much. It was such a less stressful form of cricket. Who knows if this was a one-off. Maybe I won’t be so chilled about relentless attack if it looks like we’re going to go two down in a five-match series. But I’d like to think that England will hold their nerve. Even if I can’t hold mine.
Thursday
It is hard to describe just how dead parliament is these days. You can almost hear the tumbleweed blowing down the corridors. Prime minister’s questions used to be a standing room only affair but now there are plenty of empty spaces on the government benches.
And even the MPs who are there aren’t necessarily all that they seem. The Conservative whips have taken to asking junior ministers to pack out the backbenches to cover up just how many have chosen to be elsewhere. What’s more, many of the absences have official government blessing. Tory MPs can read the opinion polls that show their party to be between 15 and 20 percentage points and are suddenly spending much time in their constituencies to try to bolster support for next year’s general election. And these are the ones who haven’t already realised they are going to lose their seat and are looking for alternative career opportunities.
Nor are the few who do come in really doing anything of value, other than making up the numbers. Because it’s not as if the government has a full legislative programme. It doesn’t. By and large, parliament is having to think up things to do to look busy. No wonder Sunak has downgraded his five promises to five priorities. His only plan is to do nothing, hold his nerve and hope things won’t get worse. Which they are and they will.
Take today, for example. After departmental questions and business questions, which only about 15 backbenchers bothered to attend, there were two pointless backbench debates. Politics for the sake of looking busy, because they had less value than a school debate. The futility was broken by Suella Braverman having to give a statement on the court of appeal ruling that the government’s Rwanda policy was illegal. Even then, there were fewer than 20 Tory MPs in the chamber to witness the big Suella Sulk. All we really learned was that the government didn’t have a plan B. Then again, it didn’t really have a plan A as the policy was never going to work, even if we did manage to send 100 refugees to Rwanda.
Braverman was adamant that most people would be appalled by the judges’ decision. That evening, not one person in the BBC Question Time audience – the majority of whom were Tory voters – thought the Rwanda plan was ethical or workable. A rare glimmer of hope.
Friday
An Australian lawyer who once acted for Hulk Hogan arrived in the UK this week to drum up support for the Enhanced Games. Aron D’Souza wants to stage an Olympic Games for all those athletes who have taken performance-enhancing drugs to compete without fear of being banned. Rather than have to be secretive about the chemical component of their training regimes, competitors could go head to head in the knowledge there will be no drugs tests. Rather, cheating is actual the whole point of their regime.
D’Souza insists several British athletes – including a medallist from the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 – have expressed an interest, and his website features an unidentified competitor saying he is the fastest person in the world but nobody knows who he is because he can’t take part in ordinary events as he would be the subject of a ban.
Why not go the whole hog and put on events for anyone on drugs. A steeplechase for people who smoke dope. Table tennis for those on psilocybin mushrooms. A contest for those taking cocaine to bore everyone by going on about how interesting they are. Weirdly, D’Souza seems to be entirely serious about the whole project. He really does believe there is public enthusiasm for seeing just how high people can jump and how fast they can run once they have combined their training schedule with a drug regime.
Instead of having to taper their activities to avoid the anti-doping squad, they can gear up on steroids and erythropoietin (EPO) to maximise their chances before events. Hmm. I’m not convinced. The organisers seem to have committed a category error. Athletes don’t take drugs just to go faster. They also do so to cheat. To secure an advantage over other athletes. So why go to the bother of outing yourself as a cheat only to have to compete on level terms with everyone else? Far better to try to fool the authorities and continue to get one over athletes who are competing clean.
