Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Levelling Up, popped up in yesterday’s Sun with an almost-apology to that newspaper’s readers (not, it should be noted, to the rest of the nation. Nor is not entirely clear that Gove actually uttered the word ‘sorry’, but that is a side-point):
“We made the wrong choice this summer about the path we should take… The Conservatives owe the public an apology for installing Liz Truss as leader… Our problems stem in large part from the aftermath of Covid and the energy price hikes caused by Putin’s war in Ukraine".
The sheer brass neck. Blaming the “aftermath of Covid” and “Putin’s war in Ukraine” for “our problems” is weapons-grade insouciant gaslighting.
(Incidentally, I am in no way sorry to see the back of the Truss & Kwarteng, who came across as tin-eared and inept. The timing of the market wobble has been well-explained by others, such as Maggie Pagano for Reaction and Ambrose Evans-Pritchard for the Telegraph).
Regarding the ‘aftermath of Covid’, let us not forget who was running the country when Parliament had been (essentially) dissolved in mid-March 2020:
Much like almost every seasonal respiratory disease epidemic (a rapid period of growth followed a rapid decline) the exponential growth phase was demonstrably over by the third weekend in March [2020], well before the shutters came down.
The powers that be knew this. When Michael Gove claimed on 27 March 2020 that “we are all at risk… the virus does not discriminate”, he was either guilty of gross incompetence or untruthfulness. It is hard to believe the former – divisive as he might be, Gove is no idiot.
Gove knows full well that his government was pushed to shut everything down by militant unions. Almost every £ wasted subsequently on furlough, testing, tracing, injection programmes and subsequent lockdowns only makes sense in the context of an attempt to keep the official narrative - namely that There Is/Was No Alternative - on life support. The leadership didn’t want to climb down as that would have incriminated them for unnecessarily laying waste to the economy.
As for the proxy war in the Ukraine being “Putin’s war”… this is simplistic drivel. I am no Putin apologist, but read what rational scribes are writing on the matter, or even challenge yourself to pick holes in some of these recent speeches. What caused the UK mainstream media to do a 180 degree turn on its pre-2022 reporting on matters Ukrainian?
Gove’s statement is a shocker. Closer to home, there would be no energy crisis if - for example - Nick Clegg hadn’t vetoed new nuclear power stations back in 2010 because they would only come on stream by 2022, and if the government hadn’t allowed critical infrastructure to fall into disuse, such as the 2017 closure of the Rough gas storage facility in the North Sea (thankfully recently re-opened). The Environment Minister at the time? Gove, of course, who had gone from being “shy green” to “full-throated environmentalist”.
It is remarkable that people put up with such abject nonsense from these so-called Leveller Uppers and their cheerleaders in the mainstream media Westminster ‘holiday camp’. After all, exactly how are EEVs (‘Emission Elsewhere Vehicles’) going to ‘save the planet’? There is no climate crisis, but people being unable to eat or heat is - and will be - a disaster or gargantuan proportions, and a totally self-inflicted one at that. Those that had a hand in hamstringing our economy should be hanging their heads in shame, not continuing to whitewash and/or post-rationalise their previous catastrophic errors.
For those that haven’t seen it, Jordan Peterson has just published a barn-storming rallying cry, a modern-day Leveller Petition:
This winter, millions of British citizens, including children, will be tipped, or dumped, into energy poverty severe enough to risk permanent damage to their health. Cold, damp houses provide the perfect breeding ground for mould that not only causes respiratory distress, but renders houses essentially unlivable once established.
One Left-leaning newspaper ran the story outlining the danger, but without a word about why this crisis has emerged: because the woke moralisers of the "environmental" movement helped to create it.
… it’s time to say no in some absolute and fundamental sense (and without hesitation) to all those who dare to propose that dooming perhaps a billion people to starvation and penury is justified by the potential consequences of failing to do so. So no one gets to say with impunity: "the planet has too many people on it."
Too many people have already been sacrificed in the last hundred years on the altar of future utopias. Enough, truly, is enough.
It is.
It is time for the Leveller Uppers to step aside - they’ve caused enough damage already - and for modern-day Levellers to stop the elitist gravy train in its tracks.
Interesting times.
Leveller Uppers vs the New Levellers
Angry Monday Morning Blues!
I agree completely. We are living in a world with no reality.
Why close down coal mines before there is a suitable sustainable alternative?
Where do people think the electricity to run their silly electric cars actually comes from?
What has Putin got to do with our energy supply? Or with us at all? The whole Russia/Ukraine thing is a local issue which probably could have been dealt with locally if NATO and the US hadn't got involved.
Gove is like all the public figures - he says what he thinks will work to his advantage at that moment. He doesn't really have an opinion does he?
Sadly, the public in general have proved themselves to be totally uninterested in politics, the economy, the environment, the world. Even their own health and the welfare of their families. So, what happens next?