+The No. 10 website reveals Starmer has talked to a few world leaders, including Biden and Netanyahu. Top priorities those two, obviously. In his chat with Netanyahu we’re told:
 
‘Turning to the conflict in Gaza, the Prime Minister reiterated his condolences for the tragic loss of life following the October attacks. He then set out the clear and urgent need for a ceasefire, the return of hostages and an immediate increase in the volume of humanitarian aid reaching civilians.’
  
No condolences for 40,000 slaughtered Palestinians then. And there’s only an urgent need for a ceasefire, not an immediate ceasefire. Bibi will be reassured that the new UK government will obfuscate all the way to the UN Security Council.
 
+Reports suggest that Alan Milburn, who has had a good post-parliamentary career promoting private health care is set to have a role in government. We can anticipate that the NHS logo will be appearing on many more privately provided services. The NHS may continue to be free at the point of need, but at what cost? Consultants in this context won’t be heart surgeons, they’ll be desk jockeys selling old rope.

Mea culpa. Yesterday I slightly misrepresented vote shares from the general election. I blame some website or other which got them wrong. In fact, Starmer’s vote share this time round was 33.7% as against Corbyn’s 32.2% in 2019. This however doesn’t alter the fact that Corbyn won more, many more votes than did Starmer. Starmer’s victory is indeed a very large parliamentary sandcastle. His cronies will be under orders never to mention their worse polling numbers, nor indeed their enormous luck.

+I got a call yesterday from my surgery following my annual health MOT. The startling news is that my liver ‘is fine.’ I can’t understand this. I have been doing my best to compromise my liver for over 50 years, all the way back to the days of the late unlamented Double Diamond (not to mention Brew 10). Then the average alcohol content of beer was around 3%. Now it’s nearer 4.5 or 5% - with a price to match. I can recall buying a pint of Tetley’s for 1/4d (about 8p now). The other day I bought a pint of Timothy Taylor’s Landlord for £5.10. One thing that hasn’t been mentioned at all in this election is how much more under Starmer we convivial types will have to fork out for our life enhancing tipples. I suspect that despite being photographed during lockdown with a beer bottle in his hand, Starmer may turn out to be a secret member of the Independent Order of Rechabites insofar as making us pay more for this sinful imbibing goes. It’s hard to imagine Rachel Reeves shying away from that prospect. And thank heavens I don’t smoke No.6 or Park Drive fags anymore (just by way of name dropping I did smoke Sullivan Powell No.3s whilst at school, thanks to having a tab at my local tobacconist (R.I.P. Paul). Those were the days!). Rachel will now be eyeing up the prospect of taxing vapes till the pips squeak. I hope so. Dreadful things.
 
+Anything else happen yesterday? Oh yes. Labour won, or more precisely the Tories lost with the help of Reform UK. Labour’s share of the vote was just 33.9%. Worth remembering that in 2017 Corbyn’s Labour won 40% of the vote, and in 2019 it was 34%. So where is the Starmer revolution? Labour actually lost several seats, and in the great leader’s seat, his vote decreased dramatically. The size of Labour’s majority is very much due to the vagaries of first past the post and will clearly be at considerable risk come the next election. One thing we should be grateful for is the defeat of the likes of Rees Smog, Liz Truss and Grant Shapps. That in itself will improve Britain’s prospects.

The long wait is nearly over and we stand on the verge of history, an epochal election that will change everybody’s lives forever. Well, maybe not, but hyperbole seems to be the order of the day. To listen to some pundits you’d think today was yer actual D-Day. But enough of the rightwing press. The question now is: what will be the character of the new government? On past evidence, it will start off with a managerial mindset, seeking to work within the bounds of its admittedly dire inheritance and its unambitious policy objectives. Its promises will come under immediate pressure, and taxation commitments will be the first to feel the heat. There is nothing unusual in this—many governments have quickly broken pledges on tax, at least since the days when Thatcher promised in the 1979 election not to increase VAT. It was practically the first thing she did. The party has had an aversion to saying much about Capital Gains Tax. That I suspect will change quite early on in the new government’s term. The party is committed to public services, but nobody should expect much relief on that front. Austerity will continue. In foreign affairs David Lammy has spoken of his friendship with rightwing Republicans—he says we may have to work with these people. Where I wonder will his pragmatism lead to as democracies take a rightward tilt? The outcome is predictable, and we have seen how Starmer, the great human rights lawyer, has fled that scene in fear of Washington’s opprobrium. Will there be anything solid about the Labour government? I suspect not, if Starmer’s performance vis-à-vis the Labour Party is concerned. Although not quite—his crackdown and purges of the left have displayed a consistent intolerance of opposing, or even questionning narratives. In the likelihood of becoming prime minister with virtually no coherent parliamentary opposition he will I think become an early victim of his own hubris. He might even believe his own propaganda, which is to say that his victory was more to do with him and ‘His’ changed Labour Party rather than the shambolic meltdown of the Tories.
 
Where will the new government be in two year’s time? It really is anybody’s guess. A huge parliamentary majority will be wasted. Having said which individual MPs can achieve good things. And of course we will be grateful to see the back of the Tories. That relief may not last long if and when the right regroups. Remember a cautionary tale from Canada, 1993:
 
‘The PCs [Progressive Conservatives] were further weakened by the emergence of new parties that were competing for its core supporters. [Prime Minister] Campbell's initial efforts helped the party recover somewhat in pre-election polls before the writs were issued. However, this momentum did not last, and the Progressive Conservatives suffered the most lopsided defeat for a Canadian governing party at the federal level, which was also the worst ever suffered by a governing party in the Western democratic world, losing all but 2 of their 156 seats and more than half of their vote from 1988.’ (Wikipedia)
 
It took a while but eventually a new version of the Canadian Conservatives were back in power—a party which interestingly enough was refashioned with the inclusion of something known as Reform. On our side of the pond their fellow travellers may look to the Canadian experience and seek to learn lessons from it far faster.

I am pleased that a Labour leaflet dropped through my letterbox yesterday which mentioned that our Tory candidate has actually zilch connection with the constituency, him being a Tory councillor in Kensington, where he obviously maintains his real home. This sort of leaflet is what used to be known in less enlightened times as ‘the crippler,’ delivered so late in the day that no time is left for your opponent to respond. Meantimes, the Mirror reports that former Tory Party chairperson Greg Hands has put out a leaflet which fails to mention in it anywhere at all that he is the Conservative Party candidate. He must be a shy Tory appealing to shy Tory voters. I wonder how much weight is placed by voters on leaflets. Not much I suspect, and since I don’t do ‘social’ media I have no idea how and to what effect people are being love bombed in that arena. But for party activists delivering leaflets is still a sacrosanct activity, a mode of connection with the physical being of the electorate. Of course, it’s only political nerds like me who actually relish picking up the promissory notes of paradise off the doormat. Having been chased away occasionally by gammon heads when out delivering leaflets myself, I have nothing but admiration for those deliverers who think their efforts will make a difference. It possibly can, but in elections you know that whatever you do it will not be enough, and much of your effort will go unnoticed by people who will always tell you ’we never see you round here.’ 

+As the US Supreme Court has shown, we should be grateful up to a point that our judges are not appointed because of their political affiliations. Of course our judges may have a strong tendency to side with the interests of the powerful (Assange’s extradition comes to mind) but they can also stop things like Boris Johnson’s premature proroguing of parliament. Now that the US Supreme Court has decreed that presidential ‘official acts’ are immune from prosecution a whole newish world opens up. I say ‘newish’ because god knows how many illegal wars and assassinations have occurred under various presidential orders without legal consequence. Since the president is commander in chief, I wonder if his or her immunity will protect those who follow the chief’s orders? Should all those loyal public servants of Richard Nixon be posthumously pardoned (if they haven’t been already) for their roles in Watergate? It’s odd to think that a U.S. citizen could be prosecuted for inciting a riot, but their president may not, so long as it was an ‘official act.’ But the placemen and women on the Supreme Court bench who have made this judgement may have ushered in more than they wished for. Whilst the current ruling is clearly designed for Trump’s benefit, it could benefit any incumbent. All they need say is ‘it was an official act.’ Who says America hasn’t got a monarchy?
 
+A longstanding debate during elections centres on the role of the press—does it influence readers to vote in a certain way, or merely reflect readers’ pre-existing views? I think I have found the answer. That bastion of bias free, trustworthy truthsaying, the Daily Express has conducted a poll of its readers and an ASTONISHING majority voted for Farage, with only a miserly 5% voting for Starmer (that he appealed to 567 Express readers—should we be worried?). I will dare to suggest that the rag hasn’t converted anybody to Farage’s camp and can only serve to solidify their devotion to the little demagogue. So far the Daily Express hasn’t endorsed any party, although the Sunday Express has endorsed Sunak. The nation awaits all of a quiver.
 
+I am delighted to read that my Tory successor in Morley, ‘Dame’ Andrea Jenkyns has got herself embroiled in a murky mess with Reform UK. According to a report in the Independent attempts were made by Reform to lure her into defecting. She has after all pictured Farage in one of her leaflets. Threats of libel suits are now flying around, with words like ‘bribery’ being mentioned. Jenkyns should never have won the seat in the first place of course, it must have been gifted to her by somebody whose name I can’t quite remember (sobbing sounds off stage).

+Stories appear now and then about the deaths of boat people—either in the English Channel or the Mediterranean—in the latter case possibly 3,000 deaths last year. Thanks to Dr Michael Mosley other types of death in the Med are now getting greater attention. These are of northern holiday makers who come south to enjoy the sun and who literally walk to their deaths in unforgiving landscapes. It seems this phenomenon has grown this year, albeit still with comparatively few mortalities. The Telegraph ran a story on it, and unsurprisingly failed to mention that the unprecedented heat may have something to do with climate change. It’s more a case of learning to take a few precautions and all will be well. Of course I would agree with taking precautions, but keeping your mobile on and carrying a water bottle (and wearing a hat) will not make the heat go away. In memory of Michael Mosley perhaps one could say ‘Just one thing: stop climate change.’
 
+As the most exciting general election ever draws to a close, Electoral Calculus has published its latest poll of polls, with a central prediction that Labour will win 470 seats, with the Tories on 61 and LibDems on 71, making the LibDems the official opposition. Were this to be the case it will be interesting to see how the LibDems go about opposing—from the left, presumably? Another scenario is possible—Electoral Calculus has Reform winning seven seats, so if the Tories did slightly better, then they may see a merger with Reform a possibility in order to ensure they can form the official opposition. Farage leader of HM Official Opposition? How exciting! At least there’d be no room on that stage for Boris Johnson to make a comeback. These permutations seem to me to be the only interesting factors in this election, unless the pollsters have got it massively wrong.