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EU Referendumreferendum,brexit,flexcit,richard north,EUEU Referendum Flexcit Impact Assessments Monographs Contact Log in Politics: the march of the Omicrons 15/12/2021 I did check yesterday to see whether there were any of them Omicrons hiding in the bushes, but there was only next door's cat peering through the fence, wondering whether to chance the brick I was about to throw at him. In the event, he decided that discretion was the better part of valour and buggered off. And I still haven't spotted any Omicrons. A lot of Tory MPs also seemed unconvinced about the great Omicron invasion, rumoured to be about 60 or 70 until Johnson met them in the Commons to reassure them that he was only doing his best for Queen and Country. According to The Times, the prime minister mounted a last-ditch charm offensive as he told Tory MPs that he had "absolutely no choice" but to introduce his measures. He told the 1922 committee that only a small proportion of those infected by Omicrons would need to go to hospital before it became a "real problem". Health secretary Sajid Javid then told MPs to "think of the chillun", stressing that if they didn't deal with the "grave threat", the Omicrons could "overwhelm the NHS" and child victims of car crashes would be left untreated. Earlier, a gruesome warning had been delivered by the government's "top public health adviser", Dr Susan Hopkins, to the effect that the Omicrons had been doubling every two to three days in the UK but the pace appeared to have speeded up. Now, she is saying, they could have infecting a million people a day by the end of December. And, by that reckoning, a week later the entire population of the UK will be infected every day. However, the net result of all this endeavour was to have the number of rebels soar to one short of a hundred, or slightly less, depending on which paper you read. The parliament's website lists 98 Tory MPs as voting against Covid passports, but rebels claimed there were two others who forgot to scan their pass to register their vote, which would take the total to 100. These are the people who would rule the country - when they can't even check-in with their own ID cards. You can see why they are opposed to passports. Many of them might forget to bring them. With or without the forgetees, though, the refusniks amount to close on half of all backbenchers - the rump that excludes the so-called payroll vote, amounting to about 214 MPs. Under the headline, "Tory Covid rebels deal hammer blow to Boris Johnson's authority", the Telegraph has joyfully describes the events in the Commons, characterising them as "the worst Parliamentary rebellion" of Johnson's premiership. It dwarfs last December's record, when 55 Tory MPs opposed a new tiered lockdown system. As Starmer's Labour Party, with a few exceptions, had already decided to back the government, there was no chance of the measures being rejected. It may well be, therefore, that Starmer gave the Tory backbenchers a free hit, allowing them to vote against their leader without having to take responsibility for dumping the new controls, which they can now blame on the opposition. One now wonders whether this will have any impact on tomorrow's by-election. Electoral folklore has it that voters tend to dislike divided parties so, in theory, last night's result should work against the Tories - assuming the news reaches North Shropshire in time to influence the vote. Should the result go against Johnson, all that will save him is to have the Omicron's rally and strike down the zillions of innocents awaiting their booster jabs, stuffing NHS hospitals with the dead and dying, with the bodies spilling into the streets as the morgues fail to cope with the extra trade. Then, at least, The Great Leader will be able to mount another prime-time television appearance - perhaps replacing the Queen's message on Christmas day. After artfully mussing up his hair once more, he will be able to declare "I told you so", as Comrade Whitty reels of the latest batch of statistics and implores the diminishing band of the living to attend one of the remaining vaccination centres for their self-administered boosters - the resident vaccinators having long departed the scene. On the other hand, if the Omicrons refuse to cooperate, and insist on making people only a few people mildly ill, Johnson may be facing a nightmare scenario. Already, there are suggestions that the illness "may be no worse than flu", while the first real-world study "finds that excess natural deaths are significantly lower than in previous waves". Having pressed the panic button, Johnson may thus have to explain why he has committed billions of taxpayer pounds to a vastly expanded vaccination programme, when most of the population remains robustly healthy - apart from the thousands dying from undiagnosed cancers and other ailments - despite not having had their jabs. It is at that point that even Tory MPs may decide they have had enough of The Great Leader. Already there are rumblings, with Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, treasurer of the 1922 Committee, saying that, after yesterday's vote, a leadership challenge in the new year was now possible. "I think that's got to be on the cards. He's got to realise that he's got to change", Sir Geoffrey says. We are told that Tory whips are working on the assumption that the number of letters of no confidence submitted by Tory MPs is already in the double figures. If 54 letters are handed into the 1922 committee, a "no confidence" vote is automatically triggered. The thing is that, despite his hopes of diverting attention from "Partygate" and other irritating distractions, The Great Leader's campaign hasn't the slightest chance of working. Before he pressed the panic button, the jabbers were processing about 400,000 people a day. Yet, despite the new, enhanced hype level, and the lengthening queues, the daily rate seems to have struggled to reach half a million on Monday, having peaked at 530,000 on Saturday. As the Guardian points out, to meet the target of vaccinating all adults by the end of the month, 1.24 million have to be processed every day - assuming a pause on Christmas Day. Thus, however much he tries, Johnson's Omicrons are a declining asset. If infections do shoot up and the NHS is overwhelmed - the roads littered with car wrecks full of dying children - he will be criticised for not ramping up the booster campaign early enough, and for not taking more robust measures. If the dead bodies fail to pile up, and the wards are full of happy children being treated for injuries sustained from car crashes, he has to explain why he has spent over half a billion pounds on a failed campaign that wasn't really necessary in the first place. For the next few days, though, there is likely to be something of a hiatus as health trusts and GP practices work out how they are going to manage the accelerated vaccination campaign. By then, we will be in the run-up to Christmas with people thinking of other things, and it will be hard to motivate them to spend hours in queues waiting for jabs. Come Christmas week, running into the new year, my guess is that the jab rate will plummet and then will struggle to pick up momentum. Unless by then the hospitals are groaning with new victims, with queues of ambulances waiting to deliver fresh loads, Johnson's "dead cat" ploy will be over. And, with luck, he will be gone by Spring. Also published on Turbulent Times. Energy: Germany leads 14/12/2021 Any number of times one harbours a treasured quotation only to find that, when it is brought out for an airing, either the quote is false or the person to whom it is attributed never actually said it. Nevertheless, it is reasonably safe to trot out the aphorism often attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, to the effect that you should "Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake". Even if he didn't use those precise words, there is little dispute that he tendered such advice to his marshals. What brought these words to mind was prime minister Johnson and his current "dead cat" strategy, gambling all on dealing with the latest iteration of Covid with a massive booster campaign and its unreachable target. It may be not much more than a gut feeling at this stage, but I am of the view that this could be his biggest mistake of an error-strewn career. As such, for a day at least, one can leave Johnson to his own devices and look at another field replete with errors, the nature of which might in the long-term be more serious and of longer lasting effect. Here, I am referring to the insanity of "net zero" and, in this particular instance, to the impact of the new coalition government in Germany. If possible, this administration is even more determined to commit collective suicide than Johnson's government which, so far, has been in the lead with its asinine ideas. Before we go there, however, we need to look at the latest developments on Nord Stream 2 where, it seems, the new German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, has intervened to say that the pipeline could not be given the green light in its current form "because it did not meet the requirements of EU energy law". This announcement, though, is a little bit odd. As far as I was aware, the matter is still with the German Federal Network Agency (Bundesnetzagentur) which, as an independent agency, is supposed to make the appropriate determinations on technical grounds, for the Federal government to forward to Brussels. However, that this is a political intervention is indicated by Baerbock who says that the "escalating tensions" on Russia’s border with Ukraine is "also a factor" because Berlin had agreed with the US that the pipeline should not be used as a political weapon in Moscow's deteriorating relationship with Kiev. The response of Moscow doesn't yet seem to have been recorded, and the pipeline operator says that it cannot provide comments on political statements about the pipeline's non-compliance with the EU's regulation. Yet Putin does seem to have an ally in the Austrians. The news agency Tass reports Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg saying that European attempts to challenge the Nord Stream 2 project are unreasonable. He thinks it is a "totally acceptable" project, so it is wrong to challenge it every time Russia comes up in a discussion. Baerbock, though, is not on her own. She has the support of her boss, the newly appointed chancellor Olaf Scholz, who had words to say about the project on his first visit to Poland. There, he promised that his government will do "whatever it takes" to ensure that natural gas continues to flow through Ukrainian territory and to prevent Russia from using the new pipeline to blackmail its pro-Western neighbour. Germany, he said, feels responsible for ensuring that the gas transit business continues to provide income to the Ukrainian economy. Such impact as there has been has, so far, been financial. The European benchmark gas price climbed by around 10 percent yesterday to a high of €116.75 per megawatt hour (MWh), with the year-ahead price later recorded as topping €200 – an unprecedented level. The UK price climbed to 296.35p a therm, just below the record closing price of 298.475p on 5 October. But if this presages misery for future energy users – commercial and domestic – this is only one of the steps by the new German seemingly directed at disrupting their energy market. At the end of November, for instance, the new coalition pledged to cease coal production, to quadruple solar PV installations on all rooftops and push renewable energy capacity to 80 percent of the country’s electricity mix – all by 2030. The 80 percent renewables target will require meeting a demand of 750 TWh, which will require 2 percent of land to be reserved for onshore wind power, and more than triple offshore wind capacity (to 30GW). The current renewable energy capacity in Germany is 53 GW for solar, 7.7 GW for offshore wind and 54 GW for onshore wind, delivering 251 TWh in 2020. And for the additional electricity to be delivered, the country's electricity grid will need considerable development. "Not only renewables expansion needs to switch on its turbo boost, also the expansion and optimisation of the grid has to happen much faster", says grid operator Tennet. Om top of that, the government is to close down its remaining three nuclear plants, one by the end of this year and the other two by late 2022 (one pictured). Such is the lack of coherence in the new coalition, though, that the plan relies on an increase in gas-powered electricity generation, by about one-third or more, up from 90 TWh in 2020 to about 120 to 150 TWh in 2030. And this, supposedly, is to be achieved at a time when Germany's gas supply has never been less secure, with the government going out of its way to increase its vulnerability to disruption. What does not seem to have been factored in is that the Ukrainian pipeline infrastructure is ageing and badly maintained so, even without the political issues, the Russians are looking to redirect flows to Nord Stream 2. If this pipeline is not approved by the regulators, Germany (and Europe generally) can expect a reduced supply of natural gas from Russia- and more so if the situation in Ukraine kicks off. If that wasn't bad enough, a reduced gas supply in the absence of nuclear and other fossil fuel generation, increases the reliance on intermittent renewables to unprecedented levels. Not only will the grid have to deal with the inherent variability, there is also the question of whether the system will have sufficient inertia to protect it from unplanned drops in capacity. It is not even certain that a national grid of the size on which Germany relies can operate with the high proportion of renewables that will emerge if Russia cuts back on the gas supply. Furthermore, because the European grid is heavily integrated, problems in Germany risk destabilising the entire system. As I have indicated before, the UK would not be insulated from such perturbations, which look as if they might be hitting us sooner than expected. With the loss of nuclear generation by the end of next year, the system will already be fragile and any action by Putin could cause the collapse of the entire European system, dragging down the UK grid as well. The only consolation we might draw from this is that Germany looks set to provide us with a working example of how not to manage a national electricity system, early enough for us to amend our policies before it is too late. Whether or not our government will have the sense to learn the lessons is another matter. It may take prolonged periods in the cold and dark before the penny finally drops. Also published on Turbulent Times. Politics: unfit for office 13/12/2021 It looks very much as if Johnson isn't waiting for his war, even if the Russians are doing their best to get one going. Instead, it seems as if he's relying on Covid OMG V.3.0 to serve as has "dead cat", having delivered an 8pm pre-recorded video last night declaring an "Omicron emergency". From the look of today's crop of front page headlines, it does seem that Johnson's plan for "a million jabs a day" to halt the "tidal wave" of Omicrons is getting prominent coverage. If nothing else, it's given a new meaning to boosterism. Despite that, a lot of people are not buying the hype, even if they only constitute a fractious if vocal minority. The assumption is that the overwhelming majority will turn up for their booster jab if called. However, it seems the media are not happy, with the Telegraph remarking in today's editorial: "Voters and MPs are exhausted and angry - and it's easy to see why", adding: "For all lessons that should've been learnt, the cash spent, and the boosterism, our anti-Covid strategy remains a game of Russian roulette". The government, the paper says, cannot help the fact that the world is now being confronted by the omicron variant, but it has to take responsibility for its failure to do enough to prepare one of the richest, most advanced countries for the oncoming storm. It then goes on to say: "No wonder so many voters, and, increasingly, back-bench MPs, ministers and Cabinet members, are cynical, angry and exhausted. Two years into this crisis, the authorities appear to have learnt little". There can, though, be only one man who bears the ultimate responsibility for the failure – the man who seeks to hide behind the "emergency" which he has just declared but, for which, he and his government is singularly unprepared. Thus, if Johnson thinks his "emergency" will cleanse the nightmare that his tenure in office has become, he may be mistaken. The media show no sign of giving up the pursuit of "Partygate" and allied matters and some are determined that the prime minister should not be given a free pass. Predictably, the Observer is up-front in making its view known, declaring: "The prime minister is unfit to govern the UK in its worst post-war crisis". And, every month of Johnson's premiership, it says, "brings a new reminder of his rank unfitness for office". Joining the Observer is Clare Foges, a columnist for The Times since 2015 and previously chief speechwriter in 10 Downing Street for David Cameron. She writes the lead op-ed under the headline, "Tories can't let Johnson brazen this one out", her theme being: "The PM's party must recognise that his carelessness and dishonesty destroy public trust and make him unfit for office". Of her piece, one passage in particular passage stands out, where she declares: Surveying the wreckage that is the British government’s reputation I am less angry at Johnson himself than at those who enabled his ascension to No 10. Like some organism that single-mindedly divides its cells over and over again, he was always going to single-mindedly reach to fill the highest office that would have him. It was up to Conservative MPs who knew he was wholly unsuited to the job to block his path to Downing Street, but a callow and shallow party kept repeating the old line about Johnson being a winner and they wanted a piece of the power. For me, that has special resonance. Back on 24 July 2019, the day after Johnson had become party leader and the day he was appointed prime minister, I published a piece for EU Referendum headed "A day of shame". We had seen, I wrote, the result of the Conservative collective losing any sense it might ever have had, bringing to office a man "I would struggle to recommend … for the post of public toilet attendant". I thus placed on record my belief that the Conservative Party action had broken the political compact, "that invisible bond which binds us in our nation to accept the authority of a prime minister, regardless of who we voted for or where our party loyalties lie, if indeed we have any". As far as I was concerned, garnering the votes of 90-plus thousand paid-up members of a political party did not entitle anyone to call themselves a prime minister of this country. That Johnson subsequently led his party to victory in the 2019 election – the second anniversary of which was yesterday – is neither here nor there. A choice between Johnson and Corbyn was no choice at all. Yet it was forced upon us by the Conservative Party which failed to elect a credible leader. It had brought shame on us and on our nation, choosing as our supposed representative a man who was so manifestly unfit for office. For the tenure of his occupation of the post of prime minister, I then wrote, "we will watch his posturing and prancing, not in the expectation of anything coherent emerging, but with the sense of frozen horror that one watches a major accident". I had no expectations from Johnson, I added, "other than of incompetence, and cannot wait for this nightmare to be over". The point, of course, is that anyone with a pulse knew that Johnson was unfit for office, long before he became prime minister. As Parris put it on Saturday, he is (and always was) a "wrong un". And, as Foges now observes, it is up to the MPs to right an historic wrong. She thus writes: If those MPs wish to repair the damage done, they must move sooner rather than later to replace the prime minister. Each further month of lying and chaos damages public trust and demeans the country. Britain deserves better. And who knows? It might even come as a relief to Johnson when the party's over. To that extent, "Partygate" and all the rest don't matter, except as an excuse – if one is needed – to get rid of the man. If the rebels can't bring him down on Tuesday, mainly because Starmer will cast his lot with the prime minister, then it will be the turn of the voters of North Shropshire. If "Partygate" et al have soured opinion to the extent that the Tories lose the seat, then the furore over the last week or so will have served its purpose. But, whether the Tories win or lose, it will still need 55 MPs to call for a leadership election, with a view to ousting Johnson. It will be too late for anything to happen before Christmas and, by the time parliament re-convenes in the New Year, the results of Johnson's "million jabs a day" gamble will be known. Most likely, the target will be missed which then leads to two possible outcomes. Either the OMG variant will rip through the population flooding the hospitals with new victims, overwhelming the NHS, or the disease will not manifest itself either in numbers or severity, suggesting that the prime minister has over-reacted. Whatever the outcome – short of a miraculous completion of the vaccination programme followed by the epidemic subsiding – Johnson will not fare well, possibly spurring on more MPs to submit their letters to the 1922 Committee. For Johnson to go down on the grounds of his own incompetence would be highly appropriate, but if it is the trivia of "Partygate" that finally brings him down – with or without the help of the voters of North Shropshire – then so be it. In the final analysis, it matters not how we get rid of him, as long as he goes. But we then have to confront Matthew Parris's fears about a successor. A Conservative Party which is stupid enough in the first place to vote Johnson as its leader is capable of any level of stupidity – even voting for Liz Truss. Getting rid of Johnson, therefore, is only the start. Also published on Turbulent Times. Politics: in Putin's hands 12/12/2021 In the scheme of things, probably the most important item on the news agenda is the Ukraine situation – some might even go far as to call it a crisis. That's what Reuters is calling it, regaling us with the news that the G7 is united in seeking to dissuade Russia from invading Ukraine. From what I can gather, this unity extends to every one of the "Group of Seven" richest democracies being determined to do absolutely everything needed to prevent a war, short of actually doing anything. Nevertheless, Washington is sending its top diplomat for Europe, Assistant Secretary Karen Donfried, to Ukraine and Russia on 13-15 December to meet with senior government officials. He will "emphasise that we can make diplomatic progress on ending the conflict in the Donbass through implementation of the Minsk agreements in support of the Normandy Format", the US State Department said in a statement. Beyond that, there is nothing very much more than anyone can do. The Russians have the initiative, and unless or until they make they make their move, there's little more to be said – or written. Unsurprisingly, therefore, the British media have focused on the drama closer to home - the life and (political) death of prime minister Johnson. The Sunday Mirror, I guess, is the newspaper closest to wielding the fatal blow as it devotes its front page to a "new PM Xmas scandal", running a long headline reading: "Tinsel, Santa hats and bubbly as Boris hosted this Covid rule-breaking No10 Christmas quiz". This culminates in the assertion that he was "Taking us for fools (again)", in block capitals. This is not one of the three parties which the media have been reporting but the strength of this piece by political editor Pippa Crerar, is that is has Johnson accused of personally breaking Covid laws on 15 December last year. He is pictured on-screen, sitting underneath a portrait of Margaret Thatcher, reading out questions. flanked by two members of his top team, one wearing a Santa hat and the other draped in tinsel. London was then under Tier 2 regulations banning any social mixing between households – which Johnson appeared to have breached by mixing with the aides. Official guidance also stated: "You must not have a work Christmas lunch or party, where that is a primarily social activity and is not otherwise permitted by the rules in your tier". More detail is furnished by Crerar, sufficient to support a view that technical breaches of the regulations had occurred on a day when 459 people had died from coronavirus, while another 33,828 had been infected. As might be expected, the papers are vying with each other to dig the dirt on Johnson, with Tim Shipman doing his bit for Queen and Country in The Sunday Times. Shipman picks up on the dog days of 2020 when he writes that members of the No 10 press team met after work every Friday evening. Wine was opened, gallows humour shared. He tells of Jack Doyle, who was then deputy director of communications, "was in the habit of giving awards for those who had gone above and beyond the call of duty". But, he writes, the 18 December was different. E-mails and WhatsApps were sent out by junior civil servants in the press team urging people to attend. One of Doyle's colleagues phoned special advisers in other departments to invite them. About 40 people gathered in a foyer outside the main press office room. "Everyone was packed shoulder to shoulder", said one who attended. "If it looks like a party, sounds like a party, stinks of booze and goes on until 2am, it is a f***ing party". Of Johnson's denial, the growing evidence that many present were "completely rat-arsed" has led to a hunt for other potential breaches of the rules, says Shipman. Those present say Johnson did not visit the Christmas gathering, although Cummings has pointed out that: "To get upstairs [to his flat] he has to walk past that area where he could see it". Johnson, we are told, did turn up for two other events. On 13 November he gave a farewell speech for Lee Cain, who left No 10 with Cummings that day after losing a power struggle with the egregious Carrie. Closer to home, it is claimed that Carrie Johnson held a party for friends that night in their flat. This is emphatically denied by No 10 and by one person alleged to have attended. Then, on November 27 Johnson gave a short speech at farewell drinks for Cleo Watson, his deputy chief of staff and a close friend of Cummings. But he did not stay long. And that, it seems, is the extent of Shipman's "dirt". Whether it sticks, or not, there are already repercussions. This, the Observer makes clear with its headline: "Scientists fear falling trust in Boris Johnson could harm bid to curb Omicron surge". Researchers, we are told, say new rules may be needed to cut deaths, but there are concerns that "fed-up" people will ignore the government. This is only to be expected, with senior behavioural experts warning that reports of Downing Street parties, where Covid rules were allegedly flouted last year, "have caused widespread anger and resentment". "It is always more difficult to re-apply restrictions because people are fatigued and generally fed up", says Linda Bauld, a professor of public health at Edinburgh University. "But now it’s going to be even harder, because trust has been eroded to a very significant level. People are really fed up with the government. And if you don’t trust the government, why would you do what the government asked you to do?" The Observer has Bauld saying that it was likely that far more people would flout rules if they were asked to limit numbers allowed indoors at one time, as happened last winter. "Many are likely to say: I'm fed up, I don't trust this government, and I want to see my friends and family, so I'm just going to ignore the rule". Now, says Shipman, Johnson faces rebellion from 60 Tories and, after the unedifying farce of Partygate, even MPs who owe him their jobs are beginning to wonder what's next. In Saturday's Times, though, Matthew Parris has no doubts about what's next. "The prime minister has been rumbled", he writes, "and for Johnson it's over". His concern, though, is that the Conservative Party might replace a charlatan with another sham. Someone decent needs to stand up and rid us of Johnson but they are "championing an empty vessel in Liz Truss". Yet that battle is to come. For the moment, we are in the throes of the decline and fall. Even his old supporters are deserting him, with Janet Daly headlining her column with: "The collapse of trust can be traced to the fatal flaws in Boris Johnson’s personality". The latest crisis in No 10 is no fleeting embarrassment, she writes, but a game-changer that has stripped the PM of any remaining credibility. In her text, she says: "I can't see any way out of this for Boris Johnson. The political crisis hinges entirely on his personality. His policy decisions are in question on the grounds that they may be a consequence of his own character flaws". Yet, for all that, while all eyes are turning to North Shropshire, I don't think an immediate resolution can be taken for granted. For the Lib-Dems to take the seat would be a huge leap and, if the Tories keep it, Johnson may live to see another day or two, even if one long-time associate is predicting: "I think for the first time that it won't be him fighting the next election". Cummings said the “silent artillery of time” would do for Johnson, predicting: "He’s done, gone by this time next year, probably summer". To prolong his active life though, the prime minister may be hoping that the Russians do make a move over the Christmas break – the ultimate "dead cat" which could divert attention from his troubles and focus minds on more serious issues. Ironically, for a fundamentally unserious man, Johnson's immediate fate could lie in the hands of a very serious man – Mr Vladimir Putin. Also published on Turbulent Times. Politics: a people's government? 11/12/2021 According to the venerable Charles Moore, the "brilliant" Boris Johnson has been let down by his own carelessness, allowing himself to get "ensnared" by a venal media led, of course, by the BBC with the Today programme in the vanguard. Yet, despite being so laughably partisan about his hero, Moore has a point. "The foetid air of Westminster intrigue, hypocrisy and moralism", he complains, "stifles the important things we need to know about our country and our world in these weird times". Indeed it does, but the point he misses is that coverage is not a matter of either or. One problem is, as I see it, the media's tendency to obsess about one particular issue, elevating it to such an extent that it dominates the news agenda. But there's another dynamic involved here, to which I alluded in an earlier piece. This is what we might call the "Al Capone effect", where a transgressor is brought down over a relatively minor issue for want of evidence on the greater sins. Here, it could be argued that we have a seriously inadequate prime minister but such are the ways of British politics that it is very difficult to bring senior politicians down over substantive issues, so the media focus on the trivia where the weakness is apparent and less easy to defend. Actually, that is not altogether true as Sir Anthony Eden resigned in the wake of the 1956 Suez affair, ostensibly for health reasons, but primarily because the venture had been an unmitigated disaster. Possibly, there are substantive issues over which the media could take Johnson to the cleaners. My issue of choice might be the burgeoning energy crisis, although such is the timescale that it would be hard to pin all the blame on one man. The same goes for the clumsy handling of the Covid-19 epidemic, where the fault goes all the way back to Blair and involves failures of every administration since. Johnson merely had the misfortune to be left standing when the music stopped. To that extent, whether it is "wallpapergate", or "partygate" or the intervention on Owen Paterson's suspension, these are issues which can be placed unequivocally and exclusively at the door of Johnson. The buck stops with him and he can't pass it on to a predecessor or another agency. Apart from the very obvious example of Suez, therefore, one wonders if it is actually possibly to bring down prime ministers on substantive grounds – their roles will either be so bound up in secrecy, or the responsibility will be so diffuse that it is almost impossible to make any charges stick. The trivia, in the context, become the proxy issues, for which prime ministers can be sanctioned when other, graver charges might not stick. But, as proxies, they can be taken fairly to represent a situation where the politicians have lost the trust or confidence of the public, in between elections where casting a vote is too blunt an instrument or too slow. And, although – as Moore has done – it is easy (and sometimes entirely justified) to cast aspersions on the motives and behaviour of the media, in this instance, it could well be that the public get a significant voice in determining the fate of Johnson, through the medium of next week's by-election in North Shropshire. Already, the Telegraph is calling the election Johnson's "own personal referendum", suggesting that: "If the Tories lose their 'safe seat', it could be the tipping point that sees the Prime Minister facing a leadership challenge". Coming up to the second anniversary of the 2019 election victory, The Times is reporting that Johnson's cabinet rivals are circling, with the prime minister in "crisis mode". Yet, it will be the voters of North Shropshire who will most likely take the decisive step. In effect, they will be acting as the proxies for the rest of the nation. There is no other mechanism by which a prime minister can be called to task, mid-term, any more than the people can appoint (or approve) a new premier in between general elections – and then, not at all because, in theory, we vote for MPs not leaders. Perhaps if we had direct elections for our prime ministers, things might be different. With proper separation of powers, where MPs were elected to scrutinise the executive instead of acting as a (shallow) ministerial gene pool, we might then have the possibility of impeachment, with parliament taking a hand, or the process of recall. In neither event, would the media be the ultimate arbiters. Thus, it really isn't sufficient for the likes of Moore to whinge about the ways of the media. The headline of his column says that Johnson "makes life far too easy for his enemies in the Westminster village", and that the PM's "fumbling excuses about a party taking place last year in Downing Street gave the press all the ammunition they needed". But if it is only such issues over which the media can make life difficult for prime ministers, then they will exploit them for that very reason. If, on the other hand, we had a professional and combative parliament, freed from the constraints of party politics, we might see MPs taking the lead, with effective, real-time evaluation of policy. As it stands, where we have an ineffectual parliament, populated by low-grade party hacks and wannabe ministers, we will not have any serious or effective scrutiny of the executive. We can see this in particular from the lacklustre performance of select committees, and from the way their hearings and reports are largely ignored by the media. If the system was strengthened, not least by giving committees the power to summon witnesses (including ministers and civil servants) and to demand that evidence be given under oath, then what was produced might have more gravitas. Such power might extend to the approval of ministers before they could be appointed by prime ministers – a power that the European Parliament has in respect of Commissioners - together with the ability to dismiss individual ministers on specified grounds, a power the EP does not have. Generally, a more powerful parliament might have had a beneficial effect on the ongoing management of Covid OMG v. 3.0. As it stands, there is a widespread suspicion that the current round of controls are a "dead cat" response by a weakened prime minister to divert attention from his own troubles. If, on the other hand, such measures were examined swiftly and effectively by a select committee, supported by its own independent experts and able to call a wide range of witnesses, any vote in the full House would be taken on the basis of the committee's recommendations, and thus be elevated beyond the party political. As it is, when parliament votes on Wednesday, we may see a significant backbench rebellion – which may or may not be tempered by electoral and party political considerations – with the opposition deciding whether to vote for or against in accordance with the political advantage it might secure. Whatever the outcome, the measures will lack conviction and authority, and compliance levels are expected to be poor. Yet, if measures are needed, it serves no-one to have a system which is unable to secure the trust and willing cooperation of those who it affects. What has been going on over the last weeks, therefore, is far more than a media storm. Judged objectively, we are seeing the effects of a dysfunctional system of government, which has lost the trust of the people and which exposes vulnerabilities which can be exploited by an equally dysfunctional media, for reasons which are not necessarily in the interests of the people. Some might suggest that this sort of glorious muddle, for which the British are famed, eventually produces the right result, but there seems less and less confidence that we have a system that is fit for purpose. If there came out of this mess a realisation that fundamental reform was necessary, than perhaps what we are going through would be worth it. In the event, though, we are likely to see more of the same. If there is to be reform, the impetus will have to come from elsewhere. We are a long way from the "people's government" that Johnson claimed we had back in those heady days (for some) in December 2019. Also published on Turbulent Times. Politics: fin de siècle? 10/12/2021 From being a tedious interlude, "Partygate" is building in energy: one party has become three, with an added quiz. And the details on the original party that are emerging do not look good. The Times is telling us that it was planned three weeks in advance with invitations sent to officials and political advisers on WhatsApp. ITV News is saying that Jack Doyle, the prime minister's communications director, gave a speech at the event and handed out awards. Spontaneous it was not. The BBC says that there were as many as 30 people present from the press team, and wonders whether Doyle can keep his job. On top of that, "wallpapergate" is making an unwelcome (for Johnson) repeat appearance after the Tory Party has been fined nearly £18,000 for improperly declaring donations towards the refurb of Number 11. Particularly damning, though, is the report by Lord Geidt, the independent adviser on ministers' interests, which records Johnson claiming that he "knew nothing" about payments for the refurbishments until immediately prior to media reports in February 2021. However, it now turns out that three months before he claimed he had first found out about how the payments were being made, Johnson was in fact asking the Tory donor - who was setting up a blind trust - for more cash to pay for the refurbishment. This has the Mirror running a front-page banner headline, "Another day … another lie", while the Telegraph's front page has Lord Geidt "on the brink of quitting", in protest at being misled. What adds to the energy is the prospect of a backbencher rebellion when the Covid OMG v.3.0 "Plan B" is put to the House next Tuesday. Some papers like the Guardian are suggesting that 30 Tories might vote against their own government, while the Mail puts the number at 50. According to The Times, some Tory MPs think that the number of rebels could be closer to 100. Whether the rebellion materialises is impossible to predict but the very fact that it is being mooted itself makes a statement. Furthermore, it comes on top of a YouGov poll which puts Labour at 37 percent against the Tories' 33 percent. This gives the opposition a four point lead, its biggest since January when the country was in the middle of the winter lockdown. This result is backed up by a Survation poll published by the Mirror, which has Labour "soaring" to 40 percent and the Tories slumping to 34 percent – a six-point lead. Says the Mirror, this is the highest poll lead for Starmer since Johnson took power. The real political energy, though, comes from that small event in North Shropshire next Thursday – the by-election for Owen Paterson's replacement. And with the Lib-Dems making a strong pitch, there is an outside chance that they could win the seat. Should that happen, it could transform that small event into the perfect political storm. It would signal the beginning of the end for Johnson, the tangible proof that he is no longer a winner. There is a major imponderable in that scenario though. For the Tories to lose one of the safest seats in the country, one they have held for 200 years, would be nothing short of a political earthquake. But, despite the hype and the fond-hopes of the Lib-Dems, it remains an outside chance. Whatever the outcome, the election should be the last major domestic political event of the year. If the Tories keep the seat, it will buy time for Johnson. He will have the whole of Christmas in which to consider his next moves, while taking "family time" after the birth of his latest child – the seventh that we know of. On the other hand, of the Tories do lose the seat, there is probably very little he will be able to do to save himself. Doubtless, the men in suits will be using the holiday to plot his replacement. If that isn't immediate, it could only be a matter of time before potential successors are ready. Tory MPs, The Times says, are speculating that more letters of no confidence in the prime minister are already being submitted to Sir Graham Brady, leader of the backbench 1922 Committee. However, even if one of his friends in the Telegraph thinks that Johnson's position is already irrecoverable, the view is that there is little chance of him being forced out immediately. This is articulated by an anonymous minister who says that Johnson will remain in post by default because there is no challenger around whom his critics could coalesce. "It's a series of unforced errors", The Times has the minister say. "People’s inboxes are glowing white-hot. Because nobody is there to challenge him he's effectively there by default. Whatever might transpire, though, it will be a distraction, and a dangerous one. Given the events stacking up elsewhere, the very last thing this country needs is a lame-duck prime minister who will combine political impotence with his own brand of incompetence. The distraction point is made by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, who observes that "there has never been a more unsettling strategic landscape" in his lifetime. It is time, he thinks, for us to turn our attention to the prospect of conflict. Ambrose doesn't mince his words, arguing that the world is at the most dangerous strategic juncture since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. He points to escalating threats on three fronts: Russia's mobilisation of a strike force on Ukraine's border; China's "dress rehearsal" for an attack on Taiwan; and Iran’s nuclear brinkmanship. On Ukraine, though, Tass conveys a statement by Chief of the Russian General Staff Valery Gerasimov, to the effect that Moscow "will thwart any provocations by Kiev in Donbass", But it then adds a commentary by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov, who says that this poses no threat to Ukraine. "I would not like to interpret the signals of our military representatives, high-placed commanders. Each perceives this signal in his own way and correctly, I hope. There is no element of a threat". Earlier, Gerasimov had claimed that the hype spread by the media about Russia allegedly bracing for an invasion of Ukraine was "a lie", while military activity on Russia’s own soil requires no notifications. So there were are then – as long as Ukraine doesn't "provoke" Russia, there's no problem. However, on the teensy-weensy chance that the Russians might just be implementing their classic maskirovka doctrine, Ambrose is right to be unnerved – we could be in for a surprise over Christmas or the New Year. This could be more so if the Israelis launch a pre-emptive strike against Iran, and there is absolutely no way of knowing what the Chinese might get up to. But there is a possibility that all three hotspots could erupt at the same time, "linked by unknown levels of collusion". Certainly, any one of the three – to say nothing of a major energy crisis - could drive our current domestic political obsessions off the table. But, even if he wasn't mired in his political troubles, the prime minister will be taking "family time" and will hardly be best placed to deal with these emerging threats. Rather than speculating wistfully about whether we were approaching the fin de siècle, we might find ourselves wishing that it was already over, and someone else was in charge – before Tehran is converted into a glass-lined car park. Also published on Turbulent Times. Media: opportunity costs 09/12/2021 Even with the story spread all over the papers and dominating the broadcast news, I am still finding it very hard to get excited about Allegra Stratton and the Downing Street party – or parties. I do understand, however, that the Downing Street shenanigans (alleged) add a further layer of disgust in the eyes of many, about the arrogance of our political élites and the impression that one rule applies to "them" and another to us – another Dominic Cummings "eye test" moment. This goes along with the widely-held view that Johnson is lying through his teeth again – which is what he always does when confronted with an uncomfortable truth. But there seem very few people prepared to believe his denials. As far as can be measured at this early stage, something of these negative sentiments are spilling over into the reaction to the prime minister's announcement yesterday that the government is to renew its guidance about home-working, is to require Covid passports for certain large gatherings, and is to extend the rules for mask wearing. There is also a hint that mandatory vaccination is being considered. One must be careful here, not to take the social media reaction as an accurate indicator of public opinion, but if the immediate responses are any guide, the authorities are going to be struggling to enforce these new measures, given the multiple pledges of civil disobedience. Commentators are thereby suggesting that Johnson has been badly damaged by the affair, with Pete suggesting that, politically, he is "dead man walking". Once again, one is reminded of Matthew Parris's prescience, now nearly a month ago. And, although I look forward to the day when we finally see the end of Johnson, rather like Pete I would sooner see him taken down over a substantive policy issue than what amounts to an essentially trivial issue. But, rather like the FBI bringing down Al Capone over tax evasion, I suppose we must take what we can get. I cannot help feeling though, that if we had serious political parties, and especially a serious opposition, we would be seeing Johnson being torn to shreds over important issues such as his stance on climate change, his energy policy, over defence and many other matters – not least his false promises over the NHS. If anything, though, the furore over a noisy cheese & wine party that took place 12 months ago in Downing Street is having the effect of drowning out substantive issues. For instance, as one commentator remarks, on the grid yesterday was Priti Patel's Borders Bill to stop illegal migrants. Yet scarcely anyone heard the message. This is an effect about which we hear too little. For every story entertained by the media, dozens are spiked and when – as is the case with the contemporary media – they start obsessing over such a narrow spectrum of events, all sorts of things get left out. We are paying a heavy opportunity cost and the currency is public ignorance. The thing is, although the media hyperventilates about the stuff they put before us, much of it is essentially very tedious. Are we really interested in how many parties there were in Downing Street last year? On the other hand, some of the stuff which is being left out – even if not of immediate, earth-shattering importance – is really interesting and may have important implications over the longer term. In the absence of media attention, therefore, I found myself last night looking at online copies of The Siberian Times, with the edition from 3 November reporting an unusual shortage of snow in southern Yakutia, the world's coldest permanently inhabited region, with temperatures between 4-12ºC above the norm. This ties in with many other stories which have made the legacy media, all on the theme of the climate change and the melting permafrost, a subject to which a number of papers have given unstinting coverage. The Independent, as late as 28 November, was featuring the adventures of a father and son team carrying out investigations in the Yakutia region, where they could "find no sign of permafrost as global warming permeates Siberia’s soil". What makes this really interesting, though, is the piece in The Siberian Times of 3 December, which reports: "Classes cancelled at the world's coldest school as temperature in Oymyakon plunges to -60ºC". Winter had finally caught up with Oymyakon, in the Yakutia region, producing near-record low temperatures – and plenty of snow. One place where the record has indisputably been broken is in St. Petersburg. According to the news agency Tass, cold weather in the Russian city had broken a daily record set 128 years ago as temperature dropped to about -21ºC on the night of 5 December - 0.4 degrees lower than on the same day back in 1893. Incidentally, St. Petersburg is not the only place breaking records. In Sweden on 6 December, it was reported that in the remote Swedish settlement of Naimakka, the temperature plummeted to -43.8ºC, setting a new seasonal record. This had been accompanied by heavy snowfall in the region, with up to 14 inches in one area. And yes, we do appreciate that this is "weather", but it is interesting all the same, especially as a contrast to the legacy media's tendency to harness stories of severe weather to the climate change bandwagon. Speaking of which (interesting stuff, that is), we can finally put to bed the Northern Sea Route and the ice-trapped ships story, which I broached on 15 November, when the drama was already more than a week old. As of 8 December the last convoy of seven vessels has been escorted by a nuclear icebreaker out of the ice, free to continue their journeys independently. Interestingly, the Russian authorities are now considering a ban on foreign vessels using the NSR. "Favourable ice conditions of past years distorted the impression of some shipowners how to work in the waters of the Northern Sea Route", General Director Mustafa Kashka says, suggesting that the authorities need to pay more attention to the choice of vessels operating in the last months of summer-autumn navigation. All's well that ends well, but armed with the knowledge of this season's drama, we can revisit the area in years to come with a better understanding of the situation, which is more than could be done if we had been reliant on the British media. And yet, while the focus is on Downing Street parties, the "net zero" beat goes on, largely unregarded, even though the indications are that the policy is unaffordable. Thus, while at least one newspaper headline complains that Johnson is "taking the public for fools", so is the media, feeding us on a diet of trivia and ignoring many of the substantive issues. Still, if it brings the resignation of Johnson that bit closer, it may just have been worth it, although the opportunity cost is unnecessarily high. Also published on Turbulent Times. Energy: the doomsday scenario 08/12/2021 "Unless we're willing to avert our attentions from [the legacy media] output and set our own agendas", writes Pete, "they'll continue to spit on us and rub our faces in it". This is his comment on the venality of contemporary media coverage, and a view with which I heartily agree. Certainly, I don't think any of the issues which fill the front pages of today's papers would have made it there, had I been involved, with the exception of the Financial Times lead, which tells us: "US [is] to demand halt to Nord Stream 2 if Russia invades Ukraine", a story partially replicated on The Times front page. We don't, of course, know if the Russians do intend to invade – the recent troop movements could be sabre-rattling, or a not-so-devious ploy to put pressure on Germany (and the EU) to speed up the Nord Stream approval process. But my guess is that, if they do, they will move on Christmas Eve, as they did when they invaded Afghanistan. However, if Russia does go into Ukraine and Germany reacts as Biden wants, the likely outcome will be the closure of the Ukraine natural gas pipelines serving the "western corridor". If this happens, there is no doubt that it will precipitate a Europe-wide energy crisis, the like of which we have never experienced before – especially as Russia has already been withholding supplies, limiting deliveries to the spot market. As different states struggle to make up their energy shortfalls, the UK will not escape the fallout. Norway, in the first instance, will be under huge pressure to divert gas supplies to mainland Europe, cutting down on UK pipeline flows. We can expect the Netherlands gas interconnector to be shut down and, as France diverts electricity to the European grid, we will be lucky to get anything through their electricity interconnectors. There will be some LNG available, but there will be strong competition for supplies, and prices will be astronomical. And no amount would be sufficient to keep the UK grid going, simply because of flow constraints. With the UK unable to meet more than half of its gas consumption from its own resources – less during winter peaks – and with only six days storage, there will have to be implemented a programme of severe gas rationing. First to go will be the major energy users – of both gas and electricity. The latter will be necessary to cut the demand for electricity generation and thus eke out gas supplies. The domestic distribution system was be protected at all costs: a drop in pressure might allow air into the system leading to multiple and possible fatal gas explosions. Thus, the next to go will be gas generation, which will almost certainly lead to widespread brownouts. On the upside, if the gas shortage is predicted, at least the electricity cuts can be managed, with warnings given and, with sufficient rotation, the durations limited. People (those who can afford to) will be able to prepare, and most of the damage contained. Without plentiful supplies of gas, though, the [electricity] grid will be extremely vulnerable to any perturbations because, as we have seen, gas generation performs the dual role of producing electricity and balancing the system. Given that we will be heavily dependent on renewables, a sudden a collapse in wind generation – could force widespread, unplanned power cuts. Worse still, a sudden, unexpected drop in output could trigger what is known as a cascade failure, where local overloads cause others power stations to drop out, until the whole system shuts down. In such an event, restoring power to the grid is not a simple matter. Sections of the grid must be isolated and a single unit reconnected to one part, and stabilised. The next plant must then be synchronised with the first before it too can be reconnected, and then the next, and the next, and so on. Restoring full functionality, even without glitches, can takes days if not weeks. As the victims of storm Arwen have been finding, there is an enormous difference between coping with a short power outage, and being without power for several days. And even in rural Scotland and Northumberland, where power supplies are never truly dependable, what was remarkable was how ill-prepared many people were. Translate this to a London power cut and it takes little to imagine what the effect might be on community life and law and order. Probably within hours, there will be looting and then rioting in our more "diverse" districts. The police may well have serious communication problems, and many staff might find it difficult to get to work, as the transport infrastructure fails in the absence of power. Large areas will be unpoliceable, and unpoliced, as available resources are directed to protecting vulnerable and priority areas. If this sounds too much like a doomsday scenario, we need to be conscious of just how fragile UK generation already is, even without the Ukraine situation blowing up. For instance, on 3 December this year, the National Grid ESO issued its first Electricity Capacity Market Notice (CMN) of the winter for the same evening, posted because the capacity margin had fallen below the threshold set out in the Capacity Market Rules. For the period, there had been an expected transmission demand and therefore operating margin of 42,518MW. However, there had been only 42,472MW of aggregate capacity of Balancing Mechanism (BM) units expected at that time. Although the notice was cancelled later the same day, it does indicate quite how tight margins actually are, when the system is supposed to be fully mobilised to meet winter demands. The previous notice had been on 8 January of this year, with an expected demand of 45,081MW. On the mainland, other countries even now are struggling, with1770648909https://eureferendum.com

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