WHEN is an apology not an apology? When it's a politician delivering it. This week we had the toe-curling spectacle of our Prime Minister telling his loyal puppy that is the Guardian newspaper that he accepted full responsibility for his role in the current crisis. Being a puppy though, it decided to lick him all over rather than, like a disgruntled mastiff not fed for a week (I'm thinking the Sun or Daily Mail) gnaw away at his leg until he really apologised.
The point is Gordon Brown has not apologised because he does not believe his role has been important, it was the Yanks and banks wot did it, not he.
This is a typical politician's sleight of hand, look like you are apologising so you can show some
contrition and humility but actually don't get into detail.
Well I've been reading a most illuminating book recently and it rather puts in context what Gordon Brown SHOULD be apologising for. Back in 1995 the leftist commentator Will Hutton caught the political zeitgeist with his book The State We're In. Hutton's book became a sensation, challenging the record of Margaret Thatcher and John Major's governments more articulately than Labour politicians had managed.
Apparently the NHS was in crisis, the economy was ravaged, debt was climbing and social problems were getting worse. He laid the foundations for Tony Blair and Gordon Brown to come forward and tell us "Things can only get better".
Well now Eamonn Butler, the man who helped put Adam Smith's statue in our high street has published a book, The Rotten State of Britain, that should do the same for Blair and Brown as Hutton did for Thatcher and Major. Somehow, though, I can't quite see the BBC's media luvvies rushing out to interview him, get him on Question Time and elevate him to one of its seer-like talking heads.
I shan't retell Butler's book, there's so much packed into it that it's hard to know where to start – but shall just focus on Brown Government's role and why he hasn't apologised.
The Prime Minister has said that the age of laissez faire capitalism that got us into trouble is now finally over. This is another politician's trick, blame something that does not in fact exist. We do not have laissez faire capitalism. This is the age of regulatory capitalism (which is why economic growth is slower) and the architect of our financial regulatory system is none other than (drum roll, please) Mr Gordon Brown.
Not only did he change all the regulatory systems but he signed off on all the appointments to his City of London chums that had courted in those famous prawn cocktail lunches. Regulations? How many do you want, Brown produced them copiously.
Furthermore, as Butler tells us, Brown promised that he would not build a boom on borrowing, but not only has public debt soared, personal debt has soared even more, thanks to those low interest rates and rising house prices.
Gordon Brown promised us an end to boom and bust but we got both. Soon unemployment will be the highest under any Labour Prime Minister in history. I could go on but I'd fill the paper.
So, yes, there's plenty to apologise for – but Gordon Brown hasn't even started yet.
Lock 'em upNo sooner had the opposition parties thankfully kicked Kenny MacAskill's idea of introducing a minimum price for alcohol back into the long grass, where it should stay, than England's public health super-nanny, Sir Liam Donaldson, announced the same idea for the English.
Apparently the UK is swimming in booze, we can't get enough of it and are all drinking to great excess. It's a big lie.
The latest figures just compiled from the Revenue and Customs (and if they don't know then no-one does) show that alcohol consumption fell last year three per cent. In fact it is now six per cent lower than it was in 2004. The worst in Europe? Actually we are 14th in alcohol consumption per head. Why does Scotland have difficulties? It's cultural attitudes I tell you, not price.
There definitely are problems related to alcohol consumption but many of these stem from our nannying Government hectoring and persecuting the occasional moderate drinker so that drinking more often occurs in binges (don't you dare have a glass of wine at lunchtime, for instance). On top of this there is an abysmal reluctance to tackle the regular violent and legless drunks that should be banged up overnight and fined for breach of the peace instead of giving them a lift home.
Making us all pay more for our bottle of wine will not deter the obnoxious drunks, criminalising them will. Build some police cells MacAskill and leave us alone to drink quietly.
