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Don’t know about you, but I’ve come to view these endless strikes as a bit like the weather. They control my life, but there’s not really an awful lot I can do about them.
As with everything these days, one must just accept the general nightmare of it all and get around it as best one can.
And so I haven’t bothered phoning the doctor about the nagging pain in my hip, because the chances of anything being done about it are vanishingly small.
As to my frozen shoulder, which is sometimes so painful it wakes me up at night, pah. Why bother? I’ll only be made to feel guilty for taking up some poor underpaid, overworked nurse’s time.
My son, who is in his A-level year, now has to get up at the crack of dawn to stand a chance of catching a delayed train or Tube to reach school on time — although this morning who knows if he will even go, since today the teachers are on strike, too
Likewise public transport. I made the mistake of going to the theatre the other night. Honestly, it would have been easier (and cheaper) to get to the Moon.
My son, who is in his A-level year, now has to get up at the crack of dawn to stand a chance of catching a delayed train or Tube to reach school on time — although this morning who knows if he will even go, since today the teachers are on strike, too.
Meanwhile, my daughter and her university colleagues are saddling themselves with debt, paying full-on fees and accommodation costs while her lecturers strike for 18 days in February (on top of the extra days last term).
I mean, there are only 28 days in February, and eight of those are weekends. So that’s, what, two days the lecturers are working next month? No wonder so many of her cohort are dropping out.
Anyway, my point is: no one gives a fig about me or anyone else whose lives are being wrecked by these strikes. Not the unions, not the Government.
The ordinary people of Britain, the ones who can’t afford to lose the work, or who don’t have nice gold-plated pensions or sharp-elbowed union reps, they’re just the mugs in the middle.
I don’t doubt that life is hard for doctors and nurses and ambulance drivers and train operators and teachers and civil servants… have I left anyone out?
Their job is to keep going so that the 54.2 per cent of the population that now receives more from the state than they pay in taxes can be kept in the style to which they have become accustomed.
I’m sorry to be so brutal, but it’s true. Britain has become a nation of two halves: those who quietly get on with the job, and those who take everything they can get. And right now, the latter are winning.
I don’t doubt that life is hard for doctors and nurses and ambulance drivers and train operators and teachers and civil servants… have I left anyone out?
But it’s also hard for everyone else. We’re all suffering the fall-out from all those stupid and (in my opinion) unnecessary lockdowns; everyone is feeling the effects of rising prices and the war in Ukraine.
What’s crucial is how you respond to those hardships.
Do you blame everyone else and make others pay by having to work twice as hard? Make their lives miserable so you can force the Government to its knees, demanding more and more of a system that simply doesn’t have the resources to give?
Or do you accept that in life there always has to be a modicum of compromise — and act with moral responsibility?
I agree: nurses do deserve to be paid more, so do ambulance drivers and junior doctors. God knows they have difficult and important jobs. But there are reasonable demands and there is pie-in-the-sky. Double-digit pay rises, which is what they are demanding, are just not feasible in the current economic climate.
It would, however, be feasible if more people were contributing more to the Exchequer; and the way to do that is not to make the dwindling pool of existing taxpayers stump up more; it’s to increase the number of taxpayers by encouraging growth and investment.
And that, I’m afraid, is hard to do when people can’t even catch a train to work or have to take endless days off sick because they can’t see their doctor.
No one gives a fig about me or anyone else whose lives are being wrecked by these strikes. Not the unions, not the Government. Pictured: Protesters outside Downing Street, London, demonstrating against the new law on strikes
That is the point that Labour and the unions and all the mini-Corbynistas on the picket-lines either don’t or won’t understand: you paralyse the country, you cripple the economy, and a crippled economy can only afford to pay its workers less, not more. It’s a vicious circle that only has one outcome: bankruptcy. Or Italy, if you prefer.
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What the Government should do is make a sensible offer. Eight per cent across the board would be my suggestion, and a cast-iron guarantee of no more industrial action for at least two years, when there would be a review.
As a taxpayer, I would be happy with that, even if it meant shelling out a bit more in the short term.
For the Government, it would be a win/win situation: either the unions accept, and everyone goes back to work; or they don’t and they lose the support of the British public.
Either way, can you please hurry up? Before we all lose the will to live.
Rude, moi? No, just French
Bond girl Eva Green has blamed her rudeness towards the producers of a doomed sci-fi film in which she was involved on her ‘Frenchness’. Best defence I’ve ever heard. Does Dominic Raab have any French ancestry, I wonder?
Bond girl Eva Green has blamed her rudeness towards the producers of a doomed sci-fi film in which she was involved on her ‘Frenchness’
If you missed Susanna Reid grilling Matt Hancock on Good Morning Britain yesterday, look up the clip online.
It was a masterclass in how an interviewer can, with great restraint, hold even someone as slippery as the former health secretary to account.
Reid is often underrated because she presents ‘fluffy’ breakfast telly — but, as Hancock proved, she’s not to be underestimated.
Parody of femininity
Thanks to people like Nicola Sturgeon, scumbags such as trans double rapist Isla Bryson (formerly Adam Graham) now think all they need to do to become ‘women’ is shove on a pair of pink leggings and a wig (see picture).
Quite apart from everything else that is wrong about this, the idea that being a woman is merely a question of hair and make-up is highly offensive.
We spend our entire lives being judged by men for our appearance; now when one despicable man appropriates our identity for his own means, he offers a crude caricature of femininity.
Quite apart from everything else that is wrong about this, the idea that being a woman is merely a question of hair and make-up is highly offensive. Pictured: Isla Bryson (formerly Adam Graham)
As a parent, you should never reward bad behaviour. Which is why it would be completely wrong for Prince Harry to attend the Coronation.
Inviting him to be present at a solemn ceremony that celebrates everything he and his wife have scorned will only encourage him to think that what he has done is acceptable — and send a signal that he can do it again.
Charles needs to stand firm, both as King and as a father, or the Sussex nightmare will never end.
My favourite recent story is ‘selfie bear’, a black bear in the U.S. state of Colorado, who has snapped more than 400 photos on a motion-activated wildlife camera, striking a series of flattering poses that even Kim Kardashian would be proud of. Talk about bear-faced cheek!
My favourite recent story is ‘selfie bear’, a black bear in the U.S. state of Colorado, who has snapped more than 400 photos on a motion-activated wildlife camera
The Alexander McQueen trouser suit that the Princess of Wales wore to launch her early years initiative this week marks a turning point in her style evolution. Nothing screams confidence more than a woman in a sharply tailored suit; a RED suit is off the scale. World, watch out.
It’s no wonder parents and pupils at King Henry VIII School in Abergavenny, were dead-set against the council renaming it the ‘Abergavenny Learning Centre’ on account of the Tudor monarch’s ‘issues’ with women. Just another example of political correctness turning our rich history into bland pulp.
In yesterday’s Daily Mail, interior designer Emma Sims-Hilditch posed the question: is it naff to colour-code your books? The answer is, of course, yes. Books are not wallpaper. They are designed to be read, not offset cushions.
I’m actually starting to get a bit worried about Meghan now. Oprah Winfrey released a picture of her birthday celebrations this weekend — and the Duchess of Sussex wasn’t there. Given the pair’s close friendship, surely it is inconceivable she wasn’t invited?
Love Island ‘star’ Paige Thorne is removing her implants after complaining her bikinis didn’t fit. Talk about first-world problems. But what I want to know is this: why do all the girls insist on wearing their bikini tops upside down? My daughter tells me it’s the fashion, but I say no wonder your boobs keep popping out, love, your bra’s the wrong way up.
