Guardian letter on need for dignitaries to speak out

Rather predictably, following Sir James Munby`s "blood on our hands" outburst, the NHS  "identified a bed" for the suicidal seventeen year old, (Bed found for suicidal girl after judge`s fury, 05/08/17) leaving him to claim, probably correctly, that NHS England would not have acted "as effectively or speedily" without his "outspoken warnings" (Judge`s plea as suicidal teenager is found refuge, 08/08/17). With new  crises being highlighted almost daily, the latest being the closure  of maternity wards, and pregnant women being "pushed from pillar to post", Munby`s example should be followed (Maternity wards closed 400 times as shortage of beds and staff grows, 08/08/17). At a time when the "austerity chickens" are coming home to roost, and Labour protests are not always getting the media attention they deserve, he cannot be the only dignitary to be appalled by the current situation; is it not incumbent upon all judges, archbishops, lords, and even some "celebrities" to make their voices heard. If the "brand" is indeed to be "reinvented", royals also could be doing more than "championing mental-health charities" (The royals, a brand reinvented by the millennial generation, 05/08/17).

    It is not only our MPs who should be feeling embarrassed by the huge inequality and unfairness which has been allowed to pervade society in the fifth richest country in the world!

Time to end the manipulation of our history

The day after possibly the worst day in British military history, July 1st, 1916, the News of the World reported that the "day went well". 20,000 British soldiers had been mown down in the first hour of the Battle of the Somme. As Tuesday`s editorial mentioned, it was the wartime Prime minister, Lloyd George, who insisted the people at home "can`t know" the awful truth (Morning Star, 01/08/17). The trouble is the British people have not only been fed lies about events during wars, they have not even been told the whole truth about the country being at war in the first place. A list of British military engagements in the same editorial lacked completeness, with Vietnam and Oman notable absentees!

     An argument can be made for remembering the courage and bravery of soldiers, as happened recently with the men from both sides who fought at Passchendaele 100 years ago, but there is a danger that, if wars are only remembered for bravery, little will be learned. People need to be reminded of the politicians` mistakes which caused the wars, the nationalism which was glorified  through education, and which was embraced by the politicians, the atrocities which all sides committed, the appalling weapons and tactics of mass destruction which were used, and the misinformation which is always fed to the public to justify all wars. How many British people have ever been told, or have even heard of, the fact that poisonous gas, or to use its modern description, chemical weapons, were used against the Germans in the First World War? Indeed, wasn`t it a certain Winston Churchill who insisted on keeping these weapons for further use in the Middle East? Commemorations, like films, often perpetuate myths, rather than destroy them!

    The film to see this summer, apparently, is "Dunkirk", but even this focuses on bravery, fellowship and courage rather than historical accuracy. Nigel Farage has endorsed it, for goodness sake, for all "youngsters" to watch! The film ignores, for example, the fact that Britain had the backing of a global empire, and was never standing "alone", and omits any acknowledgement of the roles both of the Royal Indian Army Services Corps, who were on the beach and moving supplies, and the sailors from SE Asia and India who were on the British merchant vessels. French colonial troops at Dunkirk were conspicuous only by their absence, and apart from one crowd scene, white faces predominate. How is this country ever going to come to terms with the truth of its past if its major blockbusting films insist on historical inaccuracy?

     Books which do trim away some of the layers of mythology which permeate our history are available, however, for summer reading, and  people who read them cannot fail but realise how the distorted and manipulated version of our past plays far too an important role in today`s society. Britain`s "burning the historical evidence", recounted in Ian Cobain`s book, "The History Thieves: Secrets, Lies and the Shaping of a Modern Nation", was done for the same reason Special Operations Executive records on its "incompetence" over failing to protect its agents in France during WWII, "disappeared in a fire", as told in "Last Hope Island: Britain, Occcupied Europe, and the Brotherhood That Helped Turn the Tide of War", by Lynne Olson.      

      The conspiracy to indoctrinate British people that this country has a glorious past, to be remembered with "fondness and respect", and superior to all others, is shameful, and still continues, but another book, "The Fear and the Freedom: How the Second World War Changed Us", by Keith Lowe, sets out to dispel a number of enduring myths. Using the experiences of those who lived through the conflict, Lowe refutes the idea that, whilst all Nazis were evil, the allies` moral purity won the day. Similarly, the belief, as most propaganda tells us, that it was essentially a European war is dispelled, with very effective evidence from, in particular, Sam King, a Jamaica-born RAF veteran.

     Let`s hope not only that the books become best-sellers, but that they start a trend for accurate history-telling.

      The UK`s so-called  "glorious past" actually refers to a time when the country`s wealth was created by the slave trade, piracy and looting, whilst native populations existed in a state of servitude, with atrocities and extreme acts of barbarity committed by British troops ensuring little or no resistance. Isolation was never a reality nor "splendid"! If ever we are to accept the veracity of our past, and if Germany can, it should be possible here, three changes have to be made:

 journalists and writers generally, must stop referring to the past in such terms as "Britain`s imperial glories", and her "buccaneering spirit", as they engender unhelpful images, and can contribute to ridiculous ideas about racial superiority;

 the vast archive of over 1.2 million files, which governments keep hidden from the prying eyes of historians at Hanslope Park must be handed over to the National Archives at Kew;

 the department of education has to insist on the teaching of accuracy whenever British history is delivered, with less reliance on so-called "facts", and more on analysis and evaluation of evidence, so that the students` use of "lacking completeness" can be highly rewarded. 

   Until all established beliefs about Britain`s past are thrown into question and the truth revealed and accepted, there is little chance of reducing the bigotry which permeates our society.

 

Cable`s hypocrisy

Sir Vince Cable`s desperation to win back lost Lib Dem voters has hit a new low (Brexit: Older generation with nostalgia for Empire has "shafted" Britain`s youth, says Vince Cable, 06/08/17). Claiming that the older Brexit voters with "views coloured by a nostalgia for an imperial past" have "shafted" the young really does take the biscuit, seeing as it was he and his Lib Dem associates who agreed to support the Tories` austerity policies, which ruined the future for so many young people. Not only did their complicity bring about all the cuts and real wage decreases, it harmed the education of so many by slashing state school funding and ending the important Education Maintenance Grant, and, of course, is the reason for graduates leaving university with £50,000 debt.

   The good news is that young people, as revealed by the last election, are more interested in politics than they have been for forty years or so, and most

certainly will have "sussed" out Cable, his motives, and his hypocrisy.

 

Jagger`s "concern"!

It`s little wonder that Mick Jagger is so "politically" pessimistic about this country`s future. He clearly knows how easy it is for the rich to avoid paying their fair share of taxes, and so deny the Treasury billions of pounds, causing what he calls "a lot of problems". Setting up camp in France to avoid tax in the early 1970s was followed by a tax avoidance scheme whereby the Stones` income was directed to the Netherlands. This apparently played a key role in their financial recovery, having the "satisfaction of paying £4m tax on earnings of £240m".

    How would the country manage at all without the loyalty shown by its celebrities who, almost all it seems, either pay for avoidance schemes, live abroad in low tax areas like Monaco, or set themselves up as companies so that the lower corporation tax is paid? Yes Mick, lots of us share your "sense of vulnerability of where we are as a country", which is why we won`t have to wait until next year until "these two tracks....mean nothing"!

Observer letter on Rawnsley`s bias

Andrew Rawnsley says that "everyone has lessons to learn from the general election", but conveniently has learned nothing himself about allowing his bias to dominate his writing (The Tzu Rule and other iron laws that always apply - until they don`t, 30.07.17). He couldn`t resist, for example, mentioning the "amnesia" that exists "about the number of howlers" committed by Labour during the campaign, even citing one, but listed none of the Tory "car crashes" caused by Gove`s forgetfulness over immigration, Hammond`s confusion over the funding of HS2, the costing of free breakfasts in primary schools, Fallon`s frequent errors, and, of course, Johnson`s utterings about anything.

  Rawnsley does admit Corbyn was a "more effective performer" than anticipated, 

and rightly says Labour must not be too complacent before the next election. He does, however, omit to mention that the expected "fiery scrutiny" the next manifesto will face can be countered by the addition to already popular fiscal policies of a financial transaction tax The fairness of making those earning over three times the national average pay more tax will have the electoral bonus of increasing the tax bill of financial institutions.

  Also omitted is the political advantage Labour will reap by listing the number of U-turns made to the Conservatives` manifesto since the election, the still hidden details of profligacy regarding HS2 and Crossrail 2 at the expense of the rest of the country, and the truth of the mythological Northern Powerhouse. 

   Rawnsley`s university History course will surely have involved the analysis of primary sources, but the detection of bias still seems to elude him!

Unpublished i letter on Birrell`s anti-Corbyn rant

What Ian Birrell apparently does not understand is that the millions of us whom he thinks are being "conned" by Jeremy Corbyn actually do not agree with the view that we currently have a "liberal economic concensus that has dominated our nation with such success for decades" (It`s amazing but true - Hammond deserves praise, 31/07/17). Does this "success" include the thousands of food banks in the country, the millions working on zero-hour contracts with little hope of prosperity, and the millions more living in over-priced rental accommodation with no prospects for improvement, those who have seen their "real wages" diminish, graduates with debts of £40,000 plus and aspirations blocked by ever decreasing social mobility, the victims of an unnecessary and callous austerity programme, schools and hospitals facing the future with reduced funding, and so on?

   Birrell`s unjustified scaremongering clearly shows he needs to get out more!

 

A history in need of facts

Ian Sinclair was right to take issue with the traditional depiction of events like Dunkirk which "inflates the British role and omits the unsavoury detail" (Morning Star, 28/07/17). Sadly, such management of the facts is typical of the way our history has been manipulated, in ways which glorify the role of British soldiers in war, exaggerate the enemies` atrocities, ignore events which portray the British far from the superior race many politicians like to imagine us to be, and in our domestic past, blame trade unions for the failure of business to increase productivity.

British people, instead of being allowed to know the truth of our country`s history, are refused even to see anything which might challenge the mythology of our"glorious past", and are fed crumbs of so-called secret history which have been denied to us for thirty or so years. Some "secrets" were released recently: a letter written in 1991 by the prime minister John Major to Mrs Thatcher about her poll tax, papers left by the British military governor of Spandau which advocated Hess`s release, and other innocuous Foreign office and Downing Street papers, including even the ones detailing how Churchill apparently tried to cover up the Duke of Windsor`s Nazi links, all illustrate the contempt in which governments held the British people.

  A 21st century government should not be afraid to share "secrets" with the electorate, which, let`s face it, have been treated like mugs for far too long. It`s time to repeal all legislation allowing state documents, unless their release would threaten our security, to be held in secret. Not only are we all adult enough to be told officially things about the royal family which are well known anyway, or that our revered war leader held racist views, or facts about Major fearing Thatcher`s wrath, we also deserve to know the truth about our history which is hidden from historians in the 1.2 million files locked away at Hanslope Park.

   Politicians all stress the importance of transparency, but few, if any, advocate  its use in transforming the way out history is viewed and taught. That is shameful, as almost certainly the more the truth is known, the more chance there is of  reducing bigotry and partisanship.