Andy Beckett's Blog, page 8

Even Britain’s free market bible has turned on the Tories. Do they have any friends left? | Andy Beckett

The Economist speaks to capitalism’s international elite. Its criticism of the party’s 13-year rule reflects a contempt that is now global

One of the difficulties with trying to make sense of what has happened to this country since 2010, when the Tories took office, is the absence of acknowledgment from the right about how much has gone wrong. So tribal, almost Trumpian, has most of the rightwing press become that it prefers to make excuses for the Conservatives or vague complaints about the spread of wokeness rather than seriously investigate and analyse the state of our economy and society.

In some ways, this incuriosity is no surprise. The rightwing papers have always had a propaganda function, not just campaigning for the Tories but also distorting or suppressing inconvenient facts about the distribution of power and resources. Through the emotiveness of their coverage as well, they imply that their readers’ feelings about, say, immigration, matter more than lived experience or statistics. Facts are for wimps.

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If Labour wins power, will Starmer’s safe strategy become a huge risk? | Andy Beckett

Given the mess he will inherit and potential future crises, ‘sticking-plaster politics’ may not sustain public support

The bigger Britain’s problems get, the more Labour seems to shrink. As almost every economic, social and public sector indicator flashes red, Labour politicians explain that regretfully they will only be able to do a limited amount in government about the worst set of interlocking crises in our modern history.

The more disenchantment with politics grows, the more narrowly Labour defines the kind of politicians and party members it wants. It excludes or marginalises Corbynistas, leftwingers in general, respected local government radicals such as Jamie Driscoll, and even the mild centre-left organiser Neal Lawson. The few clearly left-leaning figures who remain – for now – in the shadow cabinet, such as Ed Miliband, are briefed against by anonymous Labour sources in the Tory press. Meanwhile, Keir Starmer has increasingly regular chats with Rupert Murdoch.

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After Work by Helen Hester and Nick Srnicek review – domestic bliss

Our houses are packed with useful gadgets – so why do we still spend so much time on chores?

Does your home never feel clean enough? Is it full of half-finished DIY and maintenance projects? Is your domestic life mainly about chores rather than rest or pleasure? If the answer to some or all of these questions is yes, you may be interested in the Cowan paradox.

Forty years ago an American historian, Ruth Schwartz Cowan, revealed that the time spent on domestic labour by a typical household had not fallen since the 1870s, despite liberating new technologies such as washing machines and microwaves. This unexpected lack of progress – which in many countries continues to this day – is the huge social conundrum that Helen Hester and Nick Srnicek’s busy book explores and aims to help solve. “The reduction of unwaged [house]work is necessary,” they write, “not … simply because much of it is drudgery. Rather, this reduction is essential because it expands the availability of free time that is the prerequisite for any meaningful … freedom.”

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I watched Cameron and Osborne at the Covid inquiry. They are still in denial about the damage they inflicted on Britain | Andy Beckett

No matter how much they may squirm, the link between austerity and Britain’s pandemic outcomes is undeniable

David Cameron’s government feels so long ago. Seven years of almost constant Tory turmoil, upheaval in all the other parties, huge strikes and economic crises, the war in Ukraine and the pandemic catastrophe: together, they make Cameron’s calm resignation statement outside 10 Downing Street in 2016, and his jaunty humming afterwards, seem like something from another, less frightening era.

In some ways, the worse things get in this country, the better it is for Cameron’s reputation. Even the most damaging acts of his six-year tenure – from calling the Brexit referendum to imposing austerity to the military intervention in Libya – are steadily disappearing behind the subsequent disasters under Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak. The social liberalism of Cameron’s premiership can be overstated: he only overcame Tory opposition to same-sex marriage with Labour support. But his liberalism seems more of an achievement now that his party has reverted to being reactionary.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

This article was amended on 23 June 2023. An earlier headline referenced the Covid “inquest” instead of Covid inquiry.

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I watched Cameron and Osborne in the dock. They still refuse to take any blame over Covid | Andy Beckett

No matter how much they may squirm, the link between austerity and Britain’s pandemic outcomes is undeniable

David Cameron’s government feels so long ago. Seven years of almost constant Tory turmoil, upheaval in all the other parties, huge strikes and economic crises, the war in Ukraine and the pandemic catastrophe: together, they make Cameron’s calm resignation statement outside 10 Downing Street in 2016, and his jaunty humming afterwards, seem like something from another, less frightening era.

In some ways, the worse things get in this country, the better it is for Cameron’s reputation. Even the most damaging acts of his six-year tenure – from calling the Brexit referendum to imposing austerity to the military intervention in Libya – are steadily disappearing behind the subsequent disasters under Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak. The social liberalism of Cameron’s premiership can be overstated: he only overcame Tory opposition to same-sex marriage with Labour support. But his liberalism seems more of an achievement now that his party has reverted to being reactionary.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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So long as we treat Boris Johnson as a lone wolf, the other Tory beasts will roam free | Andy Beckett

Arguing that the former leader’s premiership was a one-off won’t prevent another calamitous Tory government

Boris Johnson is history. Or so hope Rishi Sunak, many other Tories, the sober parts of the media and most voters. Johnson’s terrible government, which ended only nine months ago, looks even more unlikely to have a sequel after this week’s extraordinarily critical report by the privileges committee on his lies to parliament about Partygate, and his equally extraordinary tantrum in response.

His three years in power, with the constant lying, corrupt sense of entitlement and lethal incompetence, are increasingly presented these days as an aberration, the product of a politician uniquely unsuited to rule us. It is now time to “move on” from the Johnson era, Tories have been saying all week, adopting the faux-casual language politicians always use when conducting awkward manoeuvres.

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Starmer is right – giving young people the vote will mean fewer big Tory wins | Andy Beckett

Politics used to be about targeting small swing groups, but finally Labour is thinking big and expanding the electorate

In a democracy, who is allowed to vote – and why – are basic but always interesting questions. Especially in a democracy as old and bodged-about as Britain, with its centuries of alterations to the electorate and yet its tendency to see each new set of arrangements as somehow natural, eternal and wise.

Beneath the self-congratulation and claims of political neutrality, however, the shape of the electorate is always the product of power struggles, which are no less intense for often being hidden from sight. How adult, or how British, you need to be to have a say in how the country is governed: these are contested issues in an ever more fluid world.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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I went to the NatCon conference expecting sinister exuberance. But all I found was doom and gloom | Andy Beckett

Speakers warned of leftwing forces creating a ‘new dark age’. They were quieter about who has been in power for 13 years

For anyone who has grown up with the idea that the right dominates Britain, it can be a shock to discover that its members are often anxious or even downright miserable. Much of this week’s already notorious National Conservatism conference in London – seen by some on the left as a gathering of immensely powerful and sinister forces – was actually very gloomy.

Over three long days in a slightly chilly church conference centre in Westminster with opaque ecclesiastical windows blotting out most of the outside world, I encountered a rightwing movement that often seemed frustrated, divided and angry – and pessimistic, even apocalyptic, about the right’s prospects. Despite 13 years of Tory government, it was widely agreed that the climate for conservatism had not got better but worse.

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Is there a future for protest in Britain? Standing in the muted republican crowd, my fears only grew | Andy Beckett

The days of anarchic, festive demonstrations seem to be over in the face of draconian laws, threatening letters and pre-emptive arrests

Last Saturday morning, it felt strange setting out to take part in the republican protest in London while knowing that its organiser had already been arrested. A queasy mixture of mild shock, anxiety and defiance sat in my stomach all the way to Trafalgar Square. Demonstrators in longstanding authoritarian countries must be used to such sensations, but as someone who since the 80s has done most of their protesting in Britain, this sense that peaceful street politics was no longer necessarily tolerated by the authorities was new and unsettling.

When I got to the square, it was reassuring to see that there was still a demonstration, but less so to realise that it was smaller than expected – a few hundred people – and that much of it was squashed into a narrow space between the National Gallery and a huge temporary wall, running almost right across the square, which appeared to have been built that morning specifically to make the protest as invisible as possible. Police ringed the demonstrators, while a constant stream of coronation-goers squeezed past. The usual atmosphere of the square on protest days, as one of Britain’s freest public spaces, was almost completely absent. Instead, the possibility of a crowd crush, more arrests or a confrontation never seemed far away.

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Britain once rioted over the price of bread. What would it take for us to confront greedflation today? | Andy Beckett

We seem to wearily accept corporate profiteering as a fact of life. But an ever poorer public can be pushed only so far

This country’s rate of inflation, the worst in western Europe, is everywhere in most people’s lives: in our anxious shopping and conversations, our late-night fears and fraught pay negotiations, our cancelled or rationed pleasures, and our sense of Britain’s shrinking possibilities. After the pandemic, Brexit, and years of austerity and political chaos, to be experiencing the biggest sustained fall in the national standard of living for over 60 years can feel like the final straw.

Yet in the endless conversations about the price of everything there is a frequent absence. The role of increased profits in the cost of living crisis remains a relatively neglected topic: sporadically raised by leftwing activists, business analysts and economists, occasionally the reason for protests, but largely avoided by the main parties, and seemingly not a consistently important issue for the wider public. Brief periods of anger about profiteering, as happened last year with the energy companies, give way to fatalistic silence.

Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist

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