It’s the logical conclusion to the disposable society. Don’t like the result of the last general election? Then just have another one. Who cares if the new government has only been in office for four months? If you’re not feeling markedly better off already then the new prime minister is clearly a dud. No matter that it actually might take years to turn around an economy that has been on its knees for more than a decade. Just never give Labour an even break. Keir Starmer is like a Premier League manager after a run of bad results. On borrowed time.
At least that’s what the likes of Nigel Farage and Elon Musk would have you believe. So thoughtful of the world’s weirdest man to take such an interest in us poor Brits. You’d have thought he had enough on his plate running the new department of government efficiency for Donald Trump. He could start by sacking himself. That would save several hundred thousand dollars.
The petition calling for a new general election has now got more than 2m signatures. Which is probably no great surprise. Far more than that voted for parties other than Labour back in July so they are probably no great fans of the government. What’s more remarkable is that anyone is taking this stuff remotely seriously. In this new world, anything you don’t like can be reversed within minutes. Apart from Brexit. That must never be tampered with under any circumstances.
We have arrived at the point where the wokest people are those who rail loudest against the wokerati. Poor Nige. Can’t manage another second under a Labour government. Of course, like most things Farage, he tries to pass it off as just a joke. A bit of populist mischief-making. But you just know that – beneath the surface – he’s deadly serious. Because if there was any chance of blagging a general election through the petition, he’d take it.
To cap the sense of the surreal, Starmer was even asked about the petition when he turned up on the This Morning sofa on Monday. He had been there ostensibly to talk about making spiking drinks illegal. “I know it’s already illegal,” he said. “But I am determined to make it even more illegal.” That should do it. Still, he treated the petition with the contempt it deserved. As far as he knew, the UK still had a constitutional limit of a five-year parliament and so far we were just four months in. Elon is going to be devastated.
But the sense that anything you don’t like can be cancelled is gaining ground everywhere. Later in the afternoon Priti Patel used an urgent question to try to get the government to ignore an arrest warrant from the international criminal court alleging that Benjamin Netanyahu has committed war crimes. In Priti’s multiverse, we should be able to pick and choose which verdicts we like and which we don’t.
So, obviously, when the ICC issues arrest warrants against Vladimir Putin we applaud its findings. But when the court finds grounds to believe that Netanyahu may have used starvation as an instrument of war then Priti throws her toys out of the pram. The ICC was nothing but a pariah court. Understandably, Labour was reluctant to agree with Priti. And to think she’s normally the first to complain about two-tier policing.
Still, no one is ever going to die wondering what Patel thinks. Most of us already know before she even speaks. It’s always the nastiest take imaginable. She is someone of whom it’s almost impossible to think the worst because she’s already one step ahead of you. On the other hand, Kemi Badenoch has taken to speaking in riddles. You know that what she’s saying is almost certainly unpleasant but there’s no way of verifying it. Her sentences begin somewhere in the middle and end in a different paragraph. There is no logic. No obvious signs of intelligence. She’s going to bore or confuse us to death.
There was no CBI conference last year – the organisation was still in deep shame over sexual misconduct allegations – so all it managed was a “winter moment”. But now it is back. Sort of. The numbers were down and the main hall was half the size of audiences past. But it is still a force that politicians feel the need to keep onside. So KemiKaze was given the lunchtime slot for a keynote slot. It was just a shame she did not bring her A-game with her.
What she said was anyone’s guess. Delegates were turning to one another in mystification. Looking for answers that were not forthcoming. But let’s see if you can make any more sense of it. Kemi wanted to deregulate because that was good for business. Er … Brexit, Kemi? Governments couldn’t do everything but she couldn’t say what it could do.
She wanted growth. Not just any growth, but a special kind of growth that you would know by looking outside. Some jobs needed to go. Some people needed social skills. Pots and kettles. There would be knobs and levers. The system was broken but she couldn’t mend it. Restaurants should forget about having menus. We needed an alternative strategy but she didn’t know what that was. She didn’t even know if she would keep Labour’s national insurance changes. Perhaps yes, perhaps no. Thank you and good night. She’s either a genius or a halfwit. You decide.
Later on, Rachel Reeves joined us for a fireside chat. Or Je ne regrette rien. There was no alternative to her tax rises. Have a go if you think you’re hard enough, CBI. Tell us what you would have done differently. No one said a word. The Ministering Angel of Death was heard in near silence. As was Kemi. The applause was several claps short of polite. Fair to say most delegates don’t seem to have a lot of faith in government’s ability to fix the economy. We are in a state of unstable stability. They will believe in growth when they see it. That way they can avoid further disappointment.
A year in Westminster: John Crace, Marina Hyde and Pippa Crerar
On Tuesday 3 December, join Crace, Hyde and Crerar as they look back at a political year like no other, live at the Barbican in London and livestreamed globally. Book tickets here or at guardian.live
Taking the Lead by John Crace is published by Little, Brown (£18.99). To support the Guardian and Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
