You could start by saying sorry

It started with the news that Cathay Pacific had sold £12,450 Business Class tickets for a Hong Kong to Lisbon flight at Economy Class prices: £1,175 by mistake. We all laughed at the idea but it sparked a thought: why would anyone pay 10 times the economy price to fly on this journey. The beds? The food? The peace and quiet? The space? By contrast, the First Class cost is 20 times the Economy one.

Yes, we all know that the high fares in the front of the plane help to reduce the costs for those of us in the back. If airlines flew with only one class then we would all be complaining. But who has this sort of money and what do they really want?

The Swedes have long recognised that a country or business at ease with itself is one where the most well-off receive no more than 20 times the salary of the least well paid. So, they might argue, Cathay Pacific's prices reflect this. The First Class passenger can be separated from the Economy one on the basis of price.

That 20 times multiple salary ceiling was broken in the UK long ago. As Polly Toynbee recently remarked, inequality shot through the roof in the 1980s and the distance between the 'haves' and the 'have nots' - or 'just about managing' in modern parlance - has continued to widen. Cedric Brown of British Gas fame was awarded a salary of £475,000 (plus a bonus of £600,000) in 1995: 47 times that of his average employee. Now FTSE 100 CEOs now regularly earn £4m a year (with/without bonuses) when salaries have been frozen of pushed down for the vast majority.

The world's 26 richest people now own as much as the poorest 50%. What a terrible condemnation of our world that we should have allowed such an imbalance.

Trickle down economics - keeping taxes low for the super rich and encouraging them to splash their cash to create jobs for the less well off - has not worked. Research shows that they simply add the benefit to their wealth.

Our local newsfeed reports that the number of paupers' funerals has doubled in recent years: 77 people in Cornwall could not afford a funeral in 2017/18. The difference between those Business Class and Economy class fares on Cathay Pacific would have paid for a decent funeral for at least three of those 77: the First Class fare would have paid for more than 6. Can we not even say goodbye to people with dignity?

You do not have to be steeped in left-wing propaganda, watch Ken Loach's I Daniel Blake or Jimmy McGovern's excellent Care on the BBC to be concerned about how the 'other half'' are treated: actually, if the figures above are to be believed, it is a lot more than half. Those films have done what Brassed Off did for a previous generation showing we have learned nothing in the interim.

Jobs advertised today across Cornwall suggest salaries of around £20k for responsible sounding jobs which are well above the capabilities of a person prepared to accept the 'minimum wage'. How do you bring up a family on a salary like that? How do you even begin to contemplate putting aside some money for the deposit on a house? Even the smallest affordable house is going to cost well over 20 times that salary, way beyond anything a mortgage company might consider.

People taking these jobs are not 'failures' that can be despised by Tory politicians. They are not relying on the state (the biggest Tory crime) They are decent people wanting decent jobs to help them live a decent life. They are, or will be, taxpayers. To precis Daniel Blake, they are not numbers, customers or service users: they are citizens. They are voters.

Thankfully, some Tory MPs are beginning to notice. Heidi Allen is on a tour of England with Labour MP Frank Field, looking at some of the most deprived areas. I've absolutely had enough she says, all too aware that her party's policies have caused problems. Will it make any difference? Will her experiences feed back into the Westminster policy bubble? I somehow doubt it.

The People's Vote people are trying to find emotional slogans that will resonate with people if we are actually allowed a second referendum on Brexit: something that will counter the We told them the first time, now tell them again: the vacuous, argument-free, thuggish slogan of the Leavers.

We all know that, amongst many people up and down the country, the original Brexit vote was a protest vote about austerity, about the centralisation of power in Westminster, about the easy life of the 'haves' in the South East, paying themselves eye-watering salaries, about the fact that 'the City' had carried on as though austerity had never happened.

The People's Vote campaigners have nothing to apologise for as they were not responsible for the failings of government over the years, but they could embarrass Parliament into an apology: into saying 'sorry'.

• Sorry for the easy win of blaming the EU for things that were all the time within the control of the government
• Sorry for wasting time on Brexit when they should have been doing something about the issues which we really face, which would really improve people's lives (rather than pandering to a pampered, over-wealthy elite)
• Sorry that economic trickle-down has failed and agreeing to do something serious about limiting fat cat salaries and insultingly large bonuses (a commitment made by the PM when she took office but which has sunk without trace) 
• Sorry that so many wealthy people were managing to avoid tax through the use of off-shore accounts when 'the people' were being screwed
• Sorry that salaries for the few had been allowed to mushroom way beyond anything realistic
• Sorry that austerity has been applied so unfairly
• Sorry for incentivising cost reduction: imagining that everything can be done to the same standards on less money, and enriching the wealthy on the proceeds
• Sorry that the social services system has been unable to cope and for managing them so inadequately with insensitive, unfair and ill-thought through procedures
• Sorry for constantly tinkering with, and under-funding vital public services like the NHS and Education 
• Sorry that there has been a need for food banks to become a main source of nourishment for so many people
• Sorry that Westminster has so concentrated power in the country, cutting budgets for local authorities and seizing all their powers of decision-making
• Sorry that the party political system has so signally failed to provide a country at ease with itself or any sense of representation for more than half the population

And, sorry, yes sorry, that we have created a society in which no one seems to turn a hair at the moral paradox that some people can afford a First Class fare on an airline when others are visiting food banks just to survive. As Thatcher might have said: if you are still travelling Economy then you have not been successful.

No MP has ever wanted to say sorry. They will avoid questions, offer fake news, twist the truth: anything to avoid the need to say that they got something wrong. They believe they are required to be omniscient and omni-competent. To apologise or admit fault would lead inexorably to the need to resign. It would fail every test they falsely set themselves. 

'Sorry' is not an easy word but it might start a new debate in the country and might do more to bring the country back together than any infighting winner-takes-all self-centred fighting in the adversarial bearpit that is our Parliament.

One can live in hope.

The (Brexit) debate rumbles on

Having delayed her 'meaningful vote' from before Christmas  into January because she was convinced she would lose it, Theresa May now faces the music on Tuesday 15 May.

A last desperate scramble for votes is taking place. To what end, we cannot know.

She threatens that to reject her deal will be 'bad faith' with the British people. Methinks she doth protest too much. Setting aside the fact that a majority of the British people did not actually vote to leave the EU, the vote actually said 'leave the EU' it did not say 'Leave the EU by St Theresa's deal'. There are lots of other ways of leaving the EU other than through her miserable deal.

The Norway model is back on the agenda. I wonder how long it will take for someone to point out that this will only give us control of fishing and agriculture and so far we have no idea what we want to do with either. We would be in the single market and customs union and would have to accept free movement (except in very exceptional circumstances); we would have no say in EU regulations and would thus be 'rule-takers.'. So much for 'taking back control'.

Meanwhile, the redoubtable Grayling says that we must do what the right wing yobs say or they will get really cross and riot. It is good to have someone like this in charge of appeasement.

As a little coda to his ferry fiasco, enjoy the attached grilling of one of his Ministers. There is nothing like a QC for being dogged and asking the same question three times.

In the debate in the House of Commons, David Lammy summed up his objections to Brexit.  

... We have a duty to tell our constituents the truth. Even when they passionately disagree.

We owe to them not only our “industry” but also our “judgement.”

We are trusted representatives, not unthinking delegates.

So why do many in this House continue to support Brexit, when they know it will wreck jobs, the NHS and our standing in the world?

This is the fundamental dishonesty at the heart of the Brexit debate.

Most MPs now recognise it in private, but do not say it in public.

Brexit is a con:

• A trick. A swindle. A fraud.
• A deception that will hurt most those people it promised to help.
• A dangerous fantasy which will make every problem it claims to solve worse.
• A campaign won on false promises and lies.

Vote Leave and Leave.EU both broke the law.

Russian interference is beyond reasonable doubt.

And by now every single campaign promise made in 2016 has come unstuck.

Brexit will not enrich our NHS - it will impoverish it.

A trade deal with Donald Trump will see US corporations privatise and dismantle the NHS one bed at a time.

And even those promises on immigration – which has so greatly enriched our country – are a lie.

After Brexit immigration will go up, not down.

When we enter negotiations with countries like India and China, they will ask for three things. Visas. Visas. And more visas. And they will get them because we will be weak.

Then there’s the myth about restoring parliamentary sovereignty. The last two years have shown what a joke that is.

• The Prime Minister has hoarded power like a deluded 21st century Henry the Eighth.
• Impact assessments have been hidden. Votes resisted and blocked. Simple opponents of a government policy bullied and threatened to get into line.
• Even when we forced this meaningful vote, the Prime Minister cancelled it, certain we would reject her disastrous deal. And oh we will reject it. Because this is a Lose-Lose compromise, which offers no certainty for our future.

All it guarantees is more years of negotiation – headed by the same clowns who guided us into this farce in the first place.

--

Mr Speaker, we are suffering from a crisis of leadership in our hour of need.

This country’s greatest moments came when we showed courage, not when we appeased.

• The courage of Wilberforce to emancipate the slaves, against the anger of the British ruling class.
• The courage of Winston Churchill to declare war on Hitler, against the appeasers in his cabinet and the country.
• The courage of Atlee and Bevan to nationalise the health service -- against the doctors who protested it was not right.

Today we must be bold, because the challenges we face are just as extreme.

We must not be afraid to tell the truth to those who do not agree.

--

Friends on this side of the house tell me to appease Labour voters in industrial towns. The former miners, the factory workers, those who feel they have been left behind.

I say we must not patronise them with cowardice. Let’s tell them the truth.

“You were sold a lie.

Parts of the media used your fears to sell papers and boost viewing figures.

Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson exploited the same prejudice to win votes.

Shame on them.

Immigrants have not taken your jobs. Our schools and colleges failed to give you skills.

Hospitals are not crumbling because of health tourists, but because a decade of austerity ground them down to the bone.

You cannot afford a house because both parties failed to build -- not because Mohammed down the road who moved in.

And wealth was hoarded in London - when it should have been shared across the country.

Blame us, blame Westminster. Do not blame Brussels for our own country’s mistakes.

And do not be angry at us for telling you the truth.

Be angry at the chancers who sold you a lie.

--

As Martin Luther King said long ago “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.”

So just as I speak plainly to the government this time around, let me also speak to the opposition about some home truths.

There is no left-wing justification for Brexit.

Ditching workers’ rights, social protections, and ending environmental cooperation is not progressive. This is a project about neoliberal deregulation. It is Thatcherism on steroids, pushed by her modern day disciples.

Leaving the EU will not free us from the injustices of global capitalism, it will make us subordinate to Trump’s US.

Socialism confined to one country will not work.

Whether you like it or not, the world we live in is global.

We can only fix the rigged system if we cooperate across border-lines.

The party of Keir Hardie has always been International.

We must not let down our young supporters by failing to stand with them on the biggest issue of our lives.

If we remain in the EU, we can reform it from the top table.

Share the load of mass migration, address excesses of the bureaucracy, and fix the inequalities between creditor and debtors.

We can recharge the economy.

We can re-fuel the NHS.

We can build the houses we need, after years of hurt.

Hope is what we need.

Remain in the EU.

Give Britain a second opportunity to decide.

Sadly, there were few MPs around to hear him as they simply could be bothered and had gone home for the weekend.

A Happy New Year?

It is always good to start the year with some good uplifting news and this has been no exception.

With the Prime Minister's deal likely to appear before the House of Commons in a week's time, Pravda has been in full flow, trying to convince us that a 'no deal' would be a disaster so that we all roll over and buy her deal. We are warned there are more messages to come in the next few days.

Meanwhile, with the PM now on borrowed time, it has been fun watching the leadership contenders all trying to stake out their claims to be 'the chosen one' to succeed her. The vanity of Ministers knows no bounds and many have been keen to show they are 'back at their desks', 'being active' or 'making an announcement' (generally ill-thought through). It gets them brownie points at No 10 and with the faithful. Needless to say they have mostly fallen over in the process.

Jeremy Hunt has been off to Singapore: oh the advantages of being the Foreign Secretary and therefore being allowed to travel whenever/wherever you want. Boris missed an important Heathrow vote using precisely the same trick.

His message was that the UK could become another Singapore: a view which was rather spoiled by the Prime Minister of Singapore who said their model would not work for the UK.

One suspects that the residents of Hartlepool and Bournemouth would agree with the Prime Minister if they saw the conditions in which people live, and looked into the political structure of Singapore: We decide what is right, no matter what the people think. Yes, that is just what Brexiters want.

He was keen to tell us that Britain's role after Brexit should be as an invisible chain linking together the democracies of the world ... yatter, yatter. What on earth is this meant to mean? Has he asked them if they wish to be bound by an invisible chain or has he been reading too much Harry Potter with his mince pies?

Gavin Williamson has been throwing his diminished weight around by suggesting that we could open military bases around the world. Why? Oh yes, we used to have them back when we had an empire.

Um, Gavin, the armed forces are way under strength and much smaller than they were in the past. Heavens, we cannot rustle up enough patrol vessels to manage the straits of Dover.

Has he even checked that the host countries want us?

Sajid Javid has been the most prominent, boldly cancelling his 'luxury safari holiday in a £800 a night lodge' in order to be seen managing the 'migrant' 'crisis' (it was neither) with 'swarms' (well a few) people trying to cross the straits of Dover in small boats.

Having played all the 'right tunes' to the Torygraph faithful, including questioning whether they were genuine asylum seekers anyway, he was then taken to task by the 'liberal elite' who pointed out that under international law he should not pre-judge their status.

He was also taken to task for suggesting that the way to manage migration was by working closely with European partners: precisely the people from who we were about to cut ourselves off and who would no longer have an EU duty to co-operate.

'Bold action' followed with two vessels being withdrawn from the Mediterranean where they were dealing with large numbers of boats, to bolster the defence of the homeland. It will take one of them several weeks to arrive by which time the 'crisis' will be over. What price it never actually bothers to return? The media will have moved on long before it gets here.

It did not take long for headlines to emerge suggesting that Javid and Williamson were scoring points off each other.

I suppose we should be grateful that Caroline Nokes was not left in charge.

The star of the show, as usual, has been Chris Grayling. He had two strings to his bow. He blamed the unions for the 3.1% rail price rises. Um, Chris, that sounds so terribly 1970s and how would you feel if you had been squeezed by the government into having no pay rise for years and then, when you did get one (perish the thought), the government blamed you for the price rises.

And after a year when he had manifestly cocked up the whole rail system with a series of gaffes like changing the national rail timetable and forgiving a whole host of franchisees who were patently incapable of running a railway.

Trains are still not arriving or departing on time and there are suggestions that the ones that do appear will soon be running at 200% capacity. Yes, I know the London Undergound does, but that is for short journeys, not for five and six hour ones.

But this was simply a warm-up to his explanation as to why he let a contract to a 'ferry company' that had no money, no ferries and had never actually done anything in its short life.

Only later did it emerge that the company's terms and conditions were copied and pasted from a pizza delivery company's website. And Grayling re-assured us that the 'due diligence has been thorough'.

But we can relax as he has also assured us that he is expecting the channel ports to operate normally in all Brexit circumstances. So that's all right then. There is no need to believe the government's own warnings about turning the M20 into a lorry park. JR-M was right that unicorns can nod lorries through in 6 seconds.

Honourable mentions should go to Matt Hancock who is something to do with Health who has been claiming that the NHS will be the best place in the world to have a baby. We have some way to go, apparently but that does not stop a Minister making a bold claim (with no money attached).

If we are the best place in the world to have a baby, might that not just lead to a greater demand for migration?

And to James Brokenshire, our worthy Minister for Housing, Communities and Local Government, for so diddling the figures that the £17m extra promised to Cornwall by central government will not actually be coming to Cornwall at all but will have to be provided by Cornwall Council.

It is so good to know the government of the country is in strong, stable, safe and reliable hands.