cf Wartime Christmases

 I was only seven years old when the Second World War ended in 1945 so my memories are probably more attuned to the immediate post-war years than the war years themselves.  Nevertheless I think they make a valuable comparison to what so many of our population feel is their entitlement today.

I can recall no great family gatherings on Christmas Day.  My father had four brothers and two sisters, my mother one brother, all living within easy reach. All but the two sisters had families.  However our Christmas Day was very much a matter of the nuclear family, though that included my maternal grandmother, who was widowed and lived with us.

 We did not have turkey for dinner, or chicken, which was still a luxury food.  Instead, we had pork, which my father would praise as "like a bit of chicken."  I have no recollection of Christmas crackers.  Maybe they weren't available, or maybe my parents regarded them as a frivolous  luxury.

 There were presents, and they must have been substantial, or at least bulky, since my sister and I both hung up pillow cases rather than stockings for Santa Claus to fill.  The prized gift was still reckoned to be the orange at the bottom of the sack.

 There wasn't a lot of time to gloat over the contents of the sack on Christmas Morning as I was a member of the Church Choir  and our fist job was  sing carols round the wards of the local hospital.

 Our choir master was called Mr Pride. However the hospital matron  caused  us all to giggle by referring to him as Mr Proudlove.  This error was never corrected over the years.  Maybe it was meant to be a joke.

 After our stint at the hospital we ran the mile or so down the hill to Church for the major morning service at 10.45.  This was the fourth of the day. There would have been a Midnight Mass but we choirboys didn't sing at that.  The choir men would have, and I suppose Mr Pride would have played the organ.  (I now realise what a hero he was.)  There would have  been a said Communion at 8 o'clock and a Sung Communion at 09.15.  Who played the organ for that I can't remember.  The singing was supported by a small group of ladies.

 Our 11.15 service was a "double."  We first sang Matins up to and including the collects, then segued seamlessly into a full Choral Communion.  Then it was home for the pork dinner with apple sauce  followed by Christmas Pudding (bought not home-made).

 I presume there was a Christmas Day radio broadcast by the King but I can't recall our ever tuning in to it.  Time at last for toys. If Christmas Day happened  on a Sunday it would be back to Church for Evensong at 06.30

Every  Boxing Day Batley played Dewsbury in the local Rugby League Derby,  though I don't suppose that actually continued during the war. My father used to take me in later years and I disappointed him by never becoming a fan.

 By writing this I'm not trying to emulate Monte Python and the famous competition as to who had the most deprived upbringing, but  merely to provide a contrast to present  expectations.  

My family Christmas was luxurious compared with those whose fathers were in the forces.  Mine was not "called up,"  partly because he was too old, and also because as  spinner in a woollen mill his occupation was "reserved."  We in the Heavy Woollen District specialised in making the heavy cloth for the uniforms of the armed forces.  (In the Crimean War we made them for both sides).  

But thousands of children didn't see their fathers for up to five years.  Similarly for many sweethearts and wives, and parents who didn't see their sons and daughters. Contact of a sort was maintained by the BBC "Home Service" which linked up with "Forces Radio" with "Two Way Family favourites."

It's worth also remembering that the Christmas Holiday for workers was just two days (one I believe in Scotland, because New Year's Day was also a holiday for them, though it wasn't in England  until 1974.) It is a measure of the economic progress we have made that we now regard the entire Christmas to New Year period as "the holiday" and some even stretch it to a fortnight.

However, the present pandemic is by far and away the most serious crisis mainland UK has experienced since 1945.  

 Prime Minister Johnson likes wartime analogies.  This week we've already had "the scientific cavalry" and "a final push".  There can be no doubt that if the lockdown rules are relaxed over the two days of Christmas (or five?) this will cause an increase in infections.  The ones who become carriers may not suffer seriously but some will inevitably pass the disease on to the more vulnerable who will.  This will equally inevitably lead to a post-Christmas spike in serious illnesses and deaths, and a further strain on the NHS staff who are already close to exhaustion.

So It is no great sacrifice to ask us, for this year only, to abandon our collective winter "knees-up" and substitute a quieter nuclear family observance instead.  The aim should be that as many of us as possible survive for Christmas next year.

Will our government have the courage to take this decision, or will they yet again, be guided not by "the science" but their focus groups?

A V Referendum III

For criticisms of the "Yes" campaign's arguments for AV please see the previous post. Here are eight arguments which in my view put a more positive and rational case for voting "Yes."

1. AV will put an end to the need for negative voting. This is sometimes called tactical voting but "negative" is a more accurate term. It means voting not to put someone in but to keep someone out: for example in the Oldham East and Saddleworth by-election urging Conservatives to vote Liberal Democrat in order to "keep Labour out." Negative voting is a regular feature of FPTP. Even in the bad old days of two party politics thousands of of Conservative votes were cast, not so much in support of Conservative policies as to "keep Labour out" and vice versa.

AV will enable everyone to cast their first preference vote positively for what they really believe in, and their second either for a genuine second preference or to keep someone out. The French do this expensively by holding two elections a week apart. In the first they vote "with the heart", in the second, after minor parties have withdrawn, "with the head" for the realistic choice. With AV we get the two for the price of one.

2. AV will produce a more civilised and rational debate. Parties will be seeking second preference as well as first preference votes, and therefore will not be so rude and scornful about each other or deliberately misrepresent each other. As Ed Milliband put it in last Thursday's Guardian:

"AV will ...force parties to admit where there is agreement between them , prising open our confrontational system so that similarities sometimes become as important as differences...Exaggerating disagreement in order to create black and white choices under first-past-the-post has only added to a particular style of politics that turns off the electorate."

In other words, AV will encourage the politics of co-operation rather than confrontation.

3. Under AV there more seats will become marginal, so the parties will have to campaign to gain the support of a winder section of the electorate rather than a tiny handful of "floating" voters in a small number of marginals.

4. AV will increase the choices open to the elector and therefore the sovereignty of each electorate. We are not forced to give a second, third or fourth preference, but we can if we wish.

5. AV will allow the views of minorities to come to the fore more quickly. For most of the second half of the last century Liberal/liberal Democrat representation was so small that our views could be ignored, so it took fifty years or so for valuable ideas for which we argued way back in the fifties and sixties (devolution to the nations and regions, a stakeholder society,and, yes, electoral reform, to name but three) to be considered in the mainstream. Britain has lost out because of this delay. Today there are other vital minorities struggling for a voice. The Greens are an obvious example. AV will bring their important views to the fore more quickly

6. By encouraging positive voting for a first choice, AV will give a truer reflection of the real opinions of the nation.

7. The House of Commons will be more representative of those opinions.

8. The Commons will become more authoritative, since each MP will have the support of at least half of his or her electors.

Alas I am not a publicist so I have no idea how to sloganise the above or condense it into the 100 word limit required by the Yes campaign website.

A V Referendum II

As a signed-up member of the "Yes to fairer votes " campaign I've received the following Email from one of the organisers:

Your story could be used to help the campaign. It might be placed on our website, used in your local press or used on a leaflet.

If you’d like to get involved then tell us in 100 words why you’re supporting Yes. If you need some help you can tell us:

· What makes you most angry about MPs?
· How do you feel about MPs who have jobs for life?
· How did the expenses scandal make you feel

My true feelings in response to these three questions will not help the campaign at all. Firstly I'm not really angry about MPs: most of them work very hard for long hours doing a rather thankless job. I am, however, exceptionally concerned that too much of their time is spent acting as welfare officers for their constituents and too little examining policy and holding the government to account. Alas the "Yes" campaign seems to want to exacerbate the present situation.

Secondly it doesn't worry me at all the some MPs have a job for life, if that is what a majority of their constituents want. The idea that once a politician has secured a "safe" seat he or she is likely to sit back and do little is, in my experience, far from the truth. I have lived in a safe seat for most of my life in the UK. First it was safe Labour, then safe Conservative, and now safe Labour again, all the result of boundary changes. But both Conservative and Labour incumbents gained reputations as "good constituency MPs" and the last two have both worked hard on my behalf, largely on issues relating to Third World Development, although my affiliation to the Liberal Democrats is well known to them.

Thirdly, on the expenses scandal, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." Who has not pushed the rules to the limits of legality what the prevailing culture accepted it and those in charge actually encouraged it. Of course some MPs went beyond the legal or moral limits, but most did not. The expenses scheme was really a method of topping up a basic salary which was seen as inadequate but politicians lacked the courage to fix - a failure of the system rather than of individual MPs.

After each of at least the last three elections there has been public outrage at the unfairness of the result. This outrage has not been confined to Liberal Democrats, Greens and others short changed by the electoral system, but has been pretty universal. Unfortunately the outrage has lasted about ten days or so and then the media carnival has moved on. It is the task of the "Yes" campaign to re-create this outrage for the 5th May. So far I am not very confident of the methods and arguments being used.

A V Referendum I

The Six O'clock News on Radio 4 yesterday reported that David Cameron and Nick Clegg had "traded blows" in the issue of the referendum A V . I admit that I haven't listened to both speeches in their entirety, but the clips I've heard from both exuded calmness, reasonableness and rationality (though naturally I placed Clegg's speech higher on the rationality scale that Cameron's). Of "blows" there was no sign. Why oh why does political debate in Britain have to be described in terms of gladiatorial combat?

Sometimes the seating arrangements of the House of Commons are blamed, but this debate will now be heard largely outside parliament, so that's no excuse. I am sorry to see the BBC creating sensationalism where none exists. Surely we can leave that to the red-tops. We rightly deplore the bear garden backbiting that characterises so many parliamentary exchanges, particularly in Questions to the Prime Minister, but why pretend that this childishness happens when politicians are behaving for once in a reasonably grown-up fashion?

Sir Ernest Barker defined democracy as "government by discussion." Let us for goodness sake have a reasonable discussion, even a "big conversation" if ex-Blairites prefer the term, based on relevant facts rather than wild imaginings, about this vital next stage in the development of our democratic machinery.

Incidentally, I suspect the BBC may have caved in to pressure form the "No" campaign and no longer refers to the referendum as being about electoral reform. This is obvious nonsense, since various far more highly debatable proposals are routinely refereed to as "reforms" without the blink of an eyelid: NHS Reform, Education Reform, Reform of the Welfare system, to name but three. If you have not yet sent a protest to the BBC Director General on this issue please do so as a matter of urgency.