Andy Beckett's Blog, page 7

A dock of sorts for the men who failed Britain during Covid – but they may yet escape | Andy Beckett

The dereliction of Boris Johnson and his allies is daily being laid bare. The key is to remember what they did and hold them to account

In so many ways, the Covid inquiry feels as if it is going very badly for the Tories. Seemingly every session in the plain, low-ceilinged, rather severe room next to Paddington station in London confirms more of our worst suspicions from the time of the pandemic about the Conservatives’ performance in government. That Boris Johnson, many of his ministers and some of his most senior advisers were disastrously unsuited to dealing with one of the most lethal crises Britain has ever faced is becoming ever clearer, question by question, document by document.

The lead counsel for the inquiry, Hugo Keith KC, sometimes uses phrases such as “failings in the heart of the government” when he is questioning ministers and ex-ministers – and even more ominously for them, when he is summarising or making observations about their answers. It’s hard to see at this stage how the inquiry’s report, the first part of which is currently scheduled for publication early next summer, can be anything other than damning. And Johnson and Rishi Sunak – or “Dr Death”, as one of the government’s most senior scientific advisers called him during the pandemic – haven’t even been interrogated by the inquiry yet. Johnson is scheduled to appear next week, with Sunak expected soon afterwards.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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The reason for these cynical power grabs: the weaker the Tories become, the stronger they need to appear | Andy Beckett

Anywhere else, this government’s tactics would look like a slow-motion coup. In Britain now, voters find them risible

Has Britain ever had a government with so little support and yet such an appetite for expanding its powers? Less than a quarter of the electorate plans to vote Conservative, according to the polls, making this one of our most unpopular governments ever. Behind this stark figure looms an even deeper dissatisfaction, built up by 13 years of scandals, lethal policy failures, broken promises and out-of-their-depth prime ministers. Whatever the Tories offer between now and the election – probably a repeat of this week’s tax cuts based on dubious public spending forecasts – a decisive majority of voters may have already made up their minds against them.

The more the government’s authority shrinks, however, the more it acts as if it has a huge mandate. It seeks to crush or ignore opposition in ways that previous, much more popular administrations such as Margaret Thatcher’s or Tony Blair’s rarely dared. The verdicts of the supreme court, the operational independence of the police, the right to vote, strike or protest, the rule of domestic and international law: these are merely obstacles, it seems, to the government’s primary task of giving the Conservatives as close to a monopoly of power as our already highly centralised political system allows.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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Labour is edging towards a hollow election victory – sowing the seeds for future disaster | Andy Beckett

Tracking right and backing a divisive war, Keir Starmer’s party resembles the Labour of 2005 – the beginning of the end of its last government

When an opposition party hasn’t won a general election for 18 years, you might expect its last success to be cited as a model for how that party could win again. Societies and suitable electoral strategies change over time, of course, but parties that don’t win very often have a limited choice of inspirational examples.

Labour is such a party. And in some ways its 2005 victory still looks an impressive achievement. Labour’s third consecutive win – the only time it has managed that – was also the last time any party took a majority of seats in England, Scotland and Wales alike. Unlike all the Tory regimes since, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown’s administrations between 2005 and 2010 could claim to be nationally representative governments.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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Thatcherite conservatism is on its last legs. I’ve had a disturbing glimpse of what might replace it | Andy Beckett

The global political right is flailing. If it is to reinvent itself, it will need a fresher vision than that espoused by Peter Thiel

Where on earth is conservatism going? In Britain, at least, the simple answer seems to be opposition, and possibly for a long time. Non-Tories scarred by previous Conservative poll recoveries and shock victories may not quite believe it yet, but a Tory implosion at the next general election is becoming likely, as their dramatically shrunken support in recent byelections has shown. Our electoral system can be brutal towards any party whose share of the vote falls below a third, and for many months most polls have put the Tories closer to a quarter.

Yet political disasters, or even just the threat of them, can also create new possibilities: the abandonment of old taboos and assumptions; the rise of new ideas, personalities, messages and alliances. Particularly since 2021, as three successive Tory premierships have become exercises in frantic reinvention, but also over a longer period of self-doubt and experimentation, a new Conservatism has been struggling to emerge.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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Starmer sells himself on stability – but does that benefit the country, or just business and elites? | Andy Beckett

The pursuit of ‘stable government’ could become a trap: there will be great pressure from the establishment to keep its privileges intact

In scary enough circumstances, “stability” can be one of the most appealing words in politics. When a country has had years of political and economic chaos, as Britain has, who doesn’t want life to be more stable? More consistency in the provision of public services, in people’s incomes, in the behaviour of governments – things taken for granted in calmer times – becomes something which voters yearn for and which ambitious politicians promise.

So far, Keir Starmer’s Labour leadership has really been one long, sometimes ruthless exercise in creating and offering stability: for the party after the turmoil under Jeremy Corbyn, for the country after the collapsing policies of the Tories, and for 10 Downing Street, which most observers expect to soon be occupied by Starmer’s solid, methodical, largely unchanging personality.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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Dogmatic, desperate and out of ideas: Manchester was the Tories’ last hurrah | Andy Beckett

Harking back to past glories was high on the agenda. But the jostling to replace Sunak suggests some are eyeing the future

What does the prospect of losing power mean for a party that feels it was born to rule? That question has been haunting the Conservatives for almost two years, ever since Boris Johnson’s administration started to unravel with the Owen Paterson and Partygate scandals in late 2021 – the period when a probably decisive proportion of voters began to conclude that they had had enough of Tory government for now.

These have been frantic years for the party, full of policy U-turns, the emergence of new factions, leadership contests, cabinet reshuffles, changes of political strategy and increasingly desperate promises to voters – such as Rishi Sunak’s this week to end “30 years” of “broken” politics and “fundamentally change our country”.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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Labour and Tories, beware: endlessly shifting right won't save the country | Andy Beckett

Self-styled ‘realists’ of both parties underestimate the depth of voters’ disillusionment with the status quo

This autumn, more than ever, British politics is a waiting game. Waiting for the Tory and Labour party conferences. Waiting for possibly pivotal byelections. Waiting to see if Labour’s large but not wholly convincing poll lead will crumble, and whether the Tories or Lib Dems will take advantage. And above all, waiting for the general election and what sort of government comes afterwards.

These are the current preoccupations of many journalists, politicians and party strategists, and of those voters who pay regular attention to politics. Yet there is also another form of waiting going on in Westminster and beyond, which is less conscious and focused but more profound. People are waiting to see if the form of politics that both main parties have been following since the mid-80s, with only a few significant interruptions, is about to be replaced by one better equipped to deal with the deep crisis in which Britain finds itself.

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Is the UK falling behind other rich economies? Yes, but that’s only part of the story | Andy Beckett

National wealth can mask, or even create, other problems. After all, we’re more than an economy: we’re a society

Now, more than ever, complaining about the state of the country is one of the main ways that Britain talks about itself. But in all the endless exchanges about the decay of public services and the cost of living, there is one theme that typically is raised only briefly before the conversation moves on.

How does today’s Britain compare with other rich countries? The answer is increasingly unsettling. Despite facing many of the same problems, such as an ageing population, the climate crisis and the diminishing returns for most people from modern capitalism, Britain seems to be struggling more than other western states. From our fragile education and transport infrastructure to our sluggish productivity, our unusually high inflation to our relatively poor public health, it appears to be falling behind traditional peers such as France and Germany, while being steadily caught up by previously much poorer societies such as Slovenia and Poland.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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The 1973 coup against democratic socialism in Chile still matters – there, in Britain and beyond | Andy Beckett

It happened 50 years ago, changed the course of world history – and revealed just how authoritarian conservatives are

Fifty years on, the 1973 coup in Chile still haunts politics there and far beyond. As we approach its anniversary, on 11 September, the violent overthrow of the elected socialist government of Salvador Allende and its replacement by the brutal dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet are already being marked in Britain, through a period of remembrance scheduled to include dozens of separate exhibitions and events. Among these will be a march in Sheffield, archival displays in Edinburgh, a concert in Swansea, and a conference and picket of the Chilean embassy in London.

Few past events in faraway countries receive this level of attention. Military takeovers were not unusual in South America during the cold war. And Chile has been a relatively stable democracy since the Pinochet dictatorship ended, 33 years ago. So why does the 1973 coup still resonate?

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It’s time for a new climate populism, to show how the super rich got us – and the planet – into this mess | Andy Beckett

From air-purified penthouses and private jets, a wealthy anti-green lobby feigns common cause with ‘ordinary people’. Let’s expose that

In Britain and far beyond, anti-environmentalists have a new favourite argument. No longer able to claim the climate crisis isn’t happening, they have switched from denial to class warfare. They argue that green policies and innovations from electric cars to heat pumps, low emission zones to eco-taxes and levies, are all unaffordable for working-class and many middle-class people, yet are being imposed regardless by an out-of-touch elite of politicians, bureaucrats and wealthy “woke capitalists”.

Most of the people making these arguments in the rightwing media were never previously much troubled by the financial struggles of what they now piously call “ordinary people”. But shamelessly shifting position is a familiar activity for the modern right. Meanwhile the cost of living crisis has given its anti-green message more force.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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