Category human rights
Ethics in UK Politics
Here below is the copy of a letter I’ve sent this week to Lord Evans of Weardale, Chair of the UK’s independent committee on standards in public life. By coincidence, just before Mr Johnson’s extraordinary contortions in the House of Commons two days ago, Lord Evans’ committee produced a report recommending certain improvements in the way ethical standards are maintained… continue reading
The Potent Appeal of the “Strong Model”
Why do certain behaviours, or opinions, or political policies, become popular at some point, where before they would have been rejected out of hand ? Why do certain approaches, or qualities of presentation, previously scorned, suddenly start to be given value ? And do all such changes represent advance, or improvement ? No.
And caught up as we are in… continue reading
Britain’s Return to Health
I want to talk about the British Labour Party which – despite everything – still occupies the ground I look to for the beginning of this nation’s regeneration and return to health.
But “ground” is one thing ; the withered and stunted vegetation I see presently over-running and littering that ground, is another.
To understand better why the Party is… continue reading
The History of the United Kingdom
Click here for a summary of this piece, consisting of just over 700 words. Are You Sitting Comfortably ? The history of the United Kingdom (whose every seam is under terrible stretch and strain just now) continues so fast, so scattered, so hurt, so incoherent, so unguided and ill-advised, that it is hard to keep up, hard to make sense… continue reading
Despatches to my Gazan Son
Justin C McIntosh has given his permission for his photograph above to be used for the cover of a long Turkish poem by Cahit Koytak, now published as a book with an English translation alongside. I am proud to have been one of the translators.
The original Turkish poem is called Gazze Risalesi. In English we have made that title… continue reading
If the People is Sovereign, Lying to the People is High Treason
As 2016 comes to an end, I want to present an argument which I believe follows from the year’s events. Different elements of the argument have already been touched on here in recent posts. I must begin with language and those first words of St John’s Gospel. In the beginning was [and was always] the Word. This Christmas, as usual,… continue reading
Naming the Beast of the Year
This beast has our country’s contours written all over it. It has leapt from out of the ruins of the city, those hollow squares, and from the great labrynth below ground where the thread got tangled, and from the wi-fi and the wires through which we do not speak but intone like digital toys or just snarl, just howl.… continue reading
The Dance of the Emperor who Wears no Clothes
The Brexit dance continues. And in London, a court case has just come to an end, in which lawyers have been debating whether or not Parliament should have influence over the Brexit process. We shall hear the result of that court case in the near future. But its implications are profoundly important and the discussion belongs beyond the court of… continue reading
Our present democracies will not rescue us from ourselves.
For the young, it will already seem a long time ago that the Soviet Communist bloc effectively closed down, its remarkable leader Mikhail Gorbachev introducing “Perestroika,” its various constituent states, including Russia itself, “giving way” to democracy in remarkably quick succession. A major symbol of that dramatic and joyful time was the destruction of the Berlin Wall in 1990. As… continue reading