Letters to the Editor

The Absurdly Long Read

@LondonNeolibs asks: How do we solve our excess supply of housing crisis? 

I’m so glad you raised the Housing Crisis.

In the UK: there are currently 640,000 vacant homes. 

That’s land being gobbled up by, big, ugly buildings, that could be turned into parks, community centres or simply left vacant (for a feeling of space).

Too many homes are not just an eyesore, it hurts our planet. Those old houses take up space that could be used by trees, lungs to help our planet breathe. Rewilding, to provide habitats for woodpeckers and pigeons.

The solution to this is obvious, of course. Demolish them all. But simply eradicating these homes would not even begin to scratch the surface.

The amount of property that could be freed up, and thus demolished, if central governments were given the authority and powers to directly intervene in people’s living arrangements and rationally organise them is enormous.

Here is my proposal: Any movement between homes, even a child staying for a sleepover, shall require a permit, applied for at least six weeks in advance. Civil Servants in Whitehall will then get to work procuring bunkbeds and other space saving devices (I would suggest outsourcing this contract to Serco) to make more effective use of their homes.

Households will thus be systematically merged over the next ten years. Not only will these households be more space efficient, they shall also be more diverse. Jamaican nurses and White Van men sleeping top and tail in tenement buildings in Carlisle. Brilliant.

Forming specific attachments to geographical locations, and even family members will become impossible, thanks to the constant, dizzying game of musical chairs being played by unreachable and unaccountable authorities in Whitehall. 

Without community or family loyalties, prejudice will become a thing of the past. Forced to huddle together for warmth under threadbare blankets, once central heating is made illegal to combat the climate crisis.

We will finally be living up to those British values of diversity, inclusion and tolerance.

@OldRoberts953 asks: Hi Tim. Could you tell us the schedule for your ideal night of television viewing?

Mr Roberts, let me begin by saying this. Watching television brainlessly, is completely beneath me. My Television is absurdly small and out of date.

Now that’s out of the way:

20:30 – Manchester United VS Germany, ITV

For a man of leisure, evenings begin late. After an unpretentious, yet tasteful Dinner, I plonk myself down with the evenings second bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon. 

But once the television comes to life, and my team (for my sins), The United, comes on, I am a man transformed. The ball is passed, then kicked. Offside, a throw in. Enrapturing, brilliant. Thirty minutes well spent.

21:00 – Today at Wimbledon, BBC Two

The evening of sport continues as I tune in to BBC Two. Watching the greats, Federer and Djokovic passing the ball between each other, brilliant.

Of course, in a normal year, I make that pilgrimage on the Southern line down to watch The Beautiful Game in person.

A life like mine, Mr Roberts, has many, many highlights. Corpus May ball, the 1997 general election and the birth of my first child. But seeing Andy Murray, in person, winning Wimbledon for Team GB: That memory has a shine like no other.

21:30 – Gardener’s world, BBC Two

At this point, two bottles down, I am not exactly Compus Mentis enough to actually control the remote, so on come Gardener’s world.

I’m not the biggest fan of the actual countryside. The locals generally have bizarre, racist views. They also seem to find me and my large circle of friends, all with young children, irritating when we crowd into their Cornwall pubs and demand drinks like San Pellegrino and Aperol Spritz. 

But the view of the countryside as shown through the lens of BBC Two, is rather pleasant. London ex-pats, who would easily fit in round a dinner table in Hampstead, enjoying their robust pensions and extensive property portfolios away from the hustle and bustle of the Big City. Quite charming, actually.

22:30 – Newsnight, BBC Two

My pleasant, drunken stupor is suddenly interrupted by the Stern, quite terrifying face of Emily Maitlis.

A word on Emily: Look, I’m ashamed to admit it. I was one of the sceptics. After all, the shoes of Paxman, that Formidable, Impressive man were hard ones to fill.

But I put my hands up. I was wrong. Emily has broken up they boys club and taught us men a thing or two about Journalism. Holding those Eton Tory Toffs to account with the kind of menacing viciousness that only women are capable of.

23:35 – Newscast, BBC One

My heart in my mouth, completely sober and on the verge of a panic attack after being barracked by Maitlis for 45 minutes, I switch back to BBC One for some lighter news entertainment.

With my cup of warm milk, fresh from the microwave, I allow the soothing Scottish tones of Adam Fleming to lull me to sleep. The presenters look unthreatening, and there is not even the slightest risk of a single original opinion or thought being expressed.

Midnight – Time for bed

And so, another day ends. Another day of good food, warmth and good company.

I want for nothing, and it is not tinged even with the slightest guilt, remorse over my pleasure, in a world of so much suffering.

@BDSixsmith asks: What would be your plan for sorting out this woke business?

Listen Ben,

I’m all for hearing the Arguments. From both sides. It’s massively important to me that the Oxford Union invites racists to say their piece. I, for one, believe in Freedom Of Speech, and in the darkness cast by this Woke Business, that is where Democracy dies.

But look: Does that make me a statue fanatic? No. And what’s more, I Back Diversity. And Inclusion. I had a very easy ride as a privately educated white man in life, and now that I’ve enjoyed the fruits of that obviously awful and terrible prejudice, I would like the drawbridge to be pulled up behind me.

And really, isn’t this all actually just an attempt by those dastardly Tory Toffs at the Top, and their lapdogs in the Murdoch press, to cover up the real issues? The absence of Sure Start Centres in our communities for example. The Mental Health Crisis.

Look: It comes down to this. I’m not a racist, and nor would I like to be perceived as such. But without declaring war on the woke, how am I going to get my Arguments published in Unherd? 

That first steppingstone on the way to the Spectator, and eventually, the fabled Speccie Summer ‘do’. Me and Andrew Neil, setting the world to rights over a few glasses of gin and tonic.

I’m sure some journalists get into the trade because they have a burning desire to change the world with their Opinion pieces in the ‘Mail Plus’. But I’m a buffalo, Ben, and I feel more comfortable with the herd.

That stampeding herd of professional journalists desperately trying to impress a publisher into giving them a book deal by repeating milquetoast, safely controversial centre-right talking points while pretending to be some sort of persecuted intellectual. 

Anything, whatever it takes to convince your parents that ‘pursuing your passion’ in writing was not, as they timidly advised you, a huge mistake.

@Jossarian1 asks: Why do you still frame this section as “letters to the editor?”. Letters are an outdated form of communication, and all the messages you respond to are, in fact, tweets. Why are you lying to your readers?

Yossarian,

Contrarianism, the kind of juvenile impulse that makes 14-year-old boys insufferable in Religious Studies classes, is excusable. Entertaining, even in small doses, a reminder to the wise to restrain ourselves from vomiting faux-intellectualism into the ears and minds of the urbane.

But here is the unforgivable crime, is that you have mixed being a contrarian with being an awful bore. In this, you have followed in the tawdry footsteps of a justly maligned Columnist for the Mail on Sunday, Peter Hitchens.

It is for the grace of God that you do not have a platform on the scale of his. I’m not sure the world could take another Peter Hitchens.

Another renaissance man with the confidence to try to contradict professional epidemiologists about the transmission of airborne diseases, because he thinks that being asked to wear a mask is a violation of Magna Carta. A man who would like to redefine the scientific method such that hypotheses are only correct if they conform with his pre-held political views. A man who is paid to argue that Daylight savings time is part of a Blairite conspiracy to allow laggard, metropolitan journalists to get out of bed later.

Yossarian, you are not that man. Nor do you need to be. 

Repent.

@PHRespecter asks: Hello Tim,

Would you ever consider going back into the mining sector, these new lithium mines in Cornwall are bound to be looking for experienced managers?

I am absolutely outraged at the prospect of Lithium mines being opened in Cornwall.

Britain is an economy of minds, not an economy of material. Of mining. They shall not frack in my Kent, they shall not mine in my Cornwall. Not on your nelly.

We have the enormous privilege of living in a wealthy, developed country. Why on earth would be put our own children through the pain and suffering concomitant to a career in rare earth metal mining? Why would we fill our countryside with the sound of screaming, crying and blood.

We have enough vacancies in the hospitality sector as it is, in the age of Brexit. I suspect the vast majority of young people would rather be pulling pints and serving chunky chips, to slowly lowering themselves down a narrow, forty-degree metal mineshaft.

And the sights are ghastly. No, not in my Back Yard. Not in yours, either. Far, far away from here.

Not to mention the Climate Crisis, which would doubtlessly be exacerbated by mining in Cornwall as opposed to say, the Congo.

There is a time and place for blood and tears. And this green and pleasant land shall never, ever be it. 

Not while I still have two, strong (albeit gouty) legs to stand on.

@CDP1882 asks: Afternoon Mr. Chapman. Who do you reckon is the “Steve Jobs of Landlording”?

It may seem arrogant to nominate myself with this esteemed title, but the parallels between myself and Mr Jobs are innumerable, and in the face of such overwhelming evidence, it would be intellectually dishonest to pretend that any other man is worthy.

Both of us live and breathe (or lived and breathed for Steve) innovation. Now, my inventions may not have patents in the sense that say, a touchscreen or a ‘lightning cable’ has. 

But they are ground-breaking not only in effectiveness, but also in the sense that they transgress moral and ethical boundaries that other, less imaginative landlords, are unwilling to cross.

Compliance. Ensuring rent payments are made on time, and that tenants abide by my energy consumption rules (phones may be charged once per day).

Charlie, have you ever bribed a tenant’s child to stop them going into school? Have you ever used your Alexa to simulate the sound of a fire crackling behind their bedroom wall? Paid local yobs from the ‘youth centre’ to throw bricks through their windows? 

Do you, Mr Peters, undertake the painstaking in-depth historical and political research necessary to arrange your tenants in such a way to maximise ethnic and religious tension?

To be honest, I think I could teach Mr Jobs a thing or two about thinking outside of the Box! If he was still alive, that is.

@Aethelbread asks: Dear Tim, what do you think of our PM being a turk?

Turkey.

The word catches in my throat.

The Essex Harlot, my memories of her, laughing and smiling, grinning and she embraced my precious Julian in her talons.

She was exactly the type to talk of trips to Turkey, with ‘the girls’. Ryanair flights at 5AM in the morning. Prosecco in the Stansted Wetherspoons. Staying in an ‘all-inclusive’ hotel, sat by a pool ‘tanning’. All you can eat buffet, all you can drink, and those fake-nailed braying women made every penny count.

Boasting of how the fake designer purses they bought were ‘made in the same factory’ as the real deal.

How is it, than I can basically share the same DNA with these ‘people’ and yet be so, so much better, in every way?

The mind boggles.

@Hooghly18 asks: Tim, How can we save our precious union?

The Union is in grave peril.

To save it, new friendships must be formed, and old feuds, forgotten.

Britain is calling. Those heavyweights of the Union must answer.

It’s response must be overwhelming, it must be Muscular and it must be United.

This is not 2014. We no longer frolick gaily in the afterglow of the Olympics, where Team GB brought Britain together. This is Brexit Britain, and this battle to save our country will have to be fought harder.

So we assemble our banners, write our letters to the Guardian, and prepare for war.

James Forsyth and Fraser Nelson, from the Spectator, that Staunch Guardian of The Union. Endless opinion pieces making an ‘emotional’, often whinging case for Great Britain. 

Powerful, interrogative journalism, exposing the dark heart of Sturgeon’s Holyrood Cabal. Under the stewardship of the Formidable Andrew Neil.

Two journalists, Aaronovitch and Martin, both alike in dignity, In the Times, where we lay our scene.

For all their love of the Arguments, their Brexit argy bargy, their love for Our Union is greater. Peace, between these warring factions, in defence of Parliament. Those institutions, and this country.

North of the Border. Brown and Galloway. The contrast could not be more stark. Brown, Quietly competent, with a tasteful charcoal suit and all the gravitas afforded a man who once sat at the right hand of Blair.

Galloway, loudly useless, never seen without a fedora. In the pay of the Braying Mullahs, that defecating monkey of the peanut gallery.

But both men speak to Scotland. And speak they must. 

They must speak to those Fishermen of Birkenhead. Those ex-miners of Glenfield, and unfortunately, those rabid racists of Spennymoor.

They will need to prepared to offer whatever it takes. However much money they need to keep our extremely important Union alive. Free dental care for Dogs. A National ‘humiliate somebody from England’ day. Move Parliament to the Isle of Skye.

Send forth those big beasts of this Union. Make those Arguments. Save Great Britain.

@prgrssiveacct asks: Having read your blog I’ve decided to stop being a layabout and instead become an upstanding member of society, a landlord. However, crime and antisocial behaviour is affecting the rents in my area. How do you propose we fix this without contradicting my left wing leanings?

This really warmed my heart, as it always does, to read that my writings are turning young people to become landlords. It is a fascinating, fulfilling career. You are on a one-way road to a lifetime of pleasure and happiness.

Look: This problem of antisocial behaviour and crime is nothing new. And has only been exacerbated by Tory cuts. Without Youth Centres, places for kids to play ping pong and drink orange squash, the Urban Youth is forced to stab each other. There is simply nothing else for them to do.

There’s nothing to be done about this. Obviously everybody on my street pays for private security, and so little vans full of tough looking Eastern European men are ready to crack down on trouble-makers and loiterers. 

This is not an economically viable solution for your tenants. Also, you have to ask, do they really deserve it? Surely the threat of crime is an incentive to work harder, save more efficiently and move to a more upstanding part of London where the high property prices keep out the riffraff, and the police aren’t too afraid to go on patrol.

It’s no use trying to fight Modern Britain. The best thing to do is to lean into it, and look on the bright side.

As I’ve said many times before, a frightened tenant is a compliant one. The constant presence of crack-addicts, beggars and street gangs can inculcate a mental state of disassociation in tenants. They simply begin to run through life as if in a trance, a machine made to work a terrible minimum wage job, returning home late to eat a microwave meal in front of the TV. 

Too concerned about being murdered to notice ‘additional charges’ on their monthly rent bill, too meek to argue when I take their entire security deposit without even bothering to provide a reason.

Always swim with the tide.

@MontyLSHL asks: How do you get hired by a prestigious institution like Lehman Brothers?

Monty, If I’ve said this once, I’ve said it a hundred times.

My younger followers need to man up, bite the bullet, and get in touch with their Father’s contacts in the city if they want to get ahead in life.

There I was, sat in my Uncle’s office in Slaughter and May. He had always wanted me to be a Lawyer, this work experience was really just a formality.

But something wasn’t sticking. Yes, Lawyers are exploitative in their own way, helping the wealthy to leverage their financial resources to avoid following the rules.

But I knew it wouldn’t be enough. Mortgages, housing. Selling that dream of property, exploiting hope, something about it was pulling me to Finance.

It was a tough conversation. Jeremy Chapman was not a man to suffer fools gladly. I admit it freely, I was nervous. Like the rest of us, Jeremy had discovered early the power of appearing to always be on the verge of losing his temper, and so using intimidation, to some extent the threat of violence, to get his way in the world.

But I think he saw in my eyes, a sort of sincerity. This was not me being lazy, shirking work.

Wordlessly, he wrote a letter to a friend at Lehman.  

@shatner_bassoon asks: Having an argument with my tenants who’ve been trying to put up a dartboard in the bedroom, of course damage to the drywall will be noticeable. But how do I approach this situation with them?

@JohnGerard5 asks: I’m having trouble with an elderly tenant, whom I want to evict, but all avenues have thus far failed.

I now plan to remove the staircase (while they are asleep upstairs).

DO you think this is a reasonable course of action? An alternative would be grenades through the letterbox.

@CEOOutspoken asks: As a former Landlord, I evicted a single Mother & her young son, when he left a scuff mark on a wall. I also didn’t approve of their potential for immorality, being a single mother. Some say I was harsh, but I’ve always defended the decision vigorously. What would be your opinion?

A few questions this week about the ethics of eviction, and how to deal with troublesome tenants.

I suspect that in some sense, this issue is a product of our modern age. One where the clear boundaries and hierarchies which guided relations between the classes have, to some extent, broken down.

For the Feudal lord, the prince, his authority was infinite. His tenant’s property, his peasants, were his, eternally.

This may seem like an attractive arrangement, in retrospect, when you have to deal with the arduous and often ludicrous legal process of eviction in Modern Britain. Tenant’s rights, enshrined in law, effectively make the practice of being a landlord impossible.

First, let’s talk about your rights. Not your legal ones, but your moral right.

You have, in my humble opinion, the absolute right to your own property. Meaning that any transgression, whether or not it was stated in a tenant’s agreement, is grounds for eviction. New piercings, blinking too quickly or just looking sad and bringing the mood down.

Of course, the law would disagree, but there comes the clever, clever trick.

Pick your tenants wisely. Native English speakers are often troublemakers, they can communicate easily with the Citizens advice bureau, use Google etc.

My preference? Elderly first-generation immigrants without close family members. Unable to seek legal help, and often used to a more brutal, violent way of conducting business. 

Now, all three of you have written in to complain about your tenants, justly so. What I am telling you is this: Planning.

Next time you take on a tenant, do your research. Get them to fill out a survey (the longer, and more labyrinthine, the better). Ask extremely intimate details like sexual preference and most feared animal (hint: Tarantulas are nearly always a sure bet). 

This will provide useful leverage in case they start to misbehave.

@yimbychris asks: Would you pose nude for this year’s @prcedoutUK Christmas card with merely your property title deeds covering areas requiring modesty?

I was really excited to get this request Chris. I’m not naturally one to show off, but I suppose to have every single one of my many, many property deeds photographed together would make for a remarkable image.

So it was with great sadness that I found out that the organisation proposed, Priced Out UK, has some very questionable links to prominent Housing Crisis Truthers, who spread ludicrous lies alleging that the cost of housing is in some way or other linked to supply.

No, I will not offer my naked body to such an organisation, only some advice.

Grow up, save up, buy a house.

@Bazinga_Bot2000 asks: Hi Tim. My relatives have inherited a house in Oxfordshire that they plan to just use as a holiday home, saying they ‘don’t see housing as an investment’. How do I get them to see sense?

Alas, and with a heavy heart, Mr Bazinga, I must remind you of that old phrase: ‘you may lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink’.

Bazinga, are you familiar, I wonder, with the works of William Shakespeare? Macbeth, specifically. A rather wonderful story, where a well-meaning woman manages to convince her feckless husband to stand up for himself, stake his claim in the world and become the man he was born to be.

As my grandfather, Cecil Chapman, was apt to reminding his subjects, land that is not developed, belongs to no one.

Does this property, outside of the legalistic definition, really belong to your relatives?

I am not openly advocating for you to murder your relatives.

I will say only this. If those first pilgrims had arrived in Plymouth Rock, seen the Native milling peacefully in those ancient forests, and sailed home empty-handed to Europe for respect of his alleged ‘property rights’, what would America be today.

Would it be that sprawling Arsenal of Democracy? That Majestic Guardian of the Western Alliance? 

The Home of the Washington Times, Bill Maher and Biden?

Pull the sword, from that stone.

@kafkaswife asks: Hi Tim. Thoughts on this whole ‘trans’ business? I note that your wife is an avid terf.

It is with some trepidation that I write this answer, Mrs Kafka.

Fear, in all honesty. You rightly raise Fiona: A woman of passion, going through middle age leaving a trail of broken plates, bruised arms and bloodied noses.

It was during her last episode of incandescent, incoherent fury, provoked by some Mary Harrington article about 15-year-old schoolboys being sent to mandatory prenatal classes, that a troubling thought struck me.

On her face, this snarling vision of aggression, I traced nothing feminine. I felt like a Chinese peasant at the mercy of a marauding Mongol, some encoded memory which I feel could only be provoked by a man.

Look, I’m not a Top Medical Expert. But think hard on the TERF, the ones in your life, or the ones who write for Unherd. 

What percentile of natural testosterone do you think these women have in relation to the wider female population?

Perhaps, underneath this obsessive hatred, jealousy.

Because these Trans teenagers, who really just want to have a small invasive surgery and live out their lives with other people respecting their gender pronouns, they have found a path to peace. 

A way to coming to terms with the conflict within them, that erupts from being assigned the wrong gender at birth in contradiction to their natural hormone levels.

But, like the passionate homophobe who makes use of the Chelsea Rent boy on the weekends, the TERF cannot come to terms with her position. She lacks the self-knowledge, the discipline and ultimately the courage to confront this deep, darkly held secret, in the bleak, bottomless abyss of her soul.

So she turns to anger, spitting blood and bile for fringe online publications, throwing any legal obstacle and challenge she can muster into the path of young people who already face widespread social discrimination and suffer disproportionately from severe mental illnesses.

Here is my advice to all the TERFS, and prospective TERFS in the making.

Consider transitioning.

@CircleEnjoyer asks: Thoughts on going to University?

Asking whether or not ‘going to University’ is a good idea, is a bit like asking me if it is a good idea to get married. In principle yes, but so much is dependent on the quality of the proposed spouse.

Circle, like men, not all Universities are created equal. Yes, Blair’s idea to increase ‘University’ attendance to 50% was an impressively effective way to massage unemployment statistics, and to give destitute Northern families in bleak, post-industrial hellscapes some hope, because their Gemma is studying English at Wolverhampton. 

Alas, with a heavy heart, it does appear that in retrospect, simply the act of attending University and paying enormous tuition fees does not actually make you intelligent or attractive to employers. So many Gemmas found out, stuck now forever behind the returns counter at CEX.

Hair, blue and orange, artificial like everything else. She eschews water, for sugary energy drinks. Food cooked only in the microwave. Mayfair cigarettes at the crack of dawn.

Look: University can be worthwhile. Oxbridge, that goes without saying, and if you are too stupid to get in but too posh to go straight ‘into the world of work’, an art college: UAL or Goldsmiths.

But for the vast majority of ‘people’, I say this. 

It’s probably just best to come to terms with your lot in life.

@58mbr asks: Hi Tim, a friend of mine has written an article (millennials never growing up and owning plants or something) taking an absolute chainsaw to his relationship with the rest of our friendship group. How can he rebuild these bridges.

Oh dear.

The pounding headache. The empty wine bottles. The deep, perishing thirst for water.

And the question:

What on earth did I get up to last night?

Memories of the past evening drip in slowly, but steadily. A rather ‘handsy’ hug with Giles’s wife. A poorly concealed chuckle when Graham announced that his daughter would be going to Central Saint Martins. The contempt on Fiona’s face when she caught you sneaking a third portion of trifle into bed.

In my experience, Browman, best practice is to apologise directly. I’ve tried material goods before, flowers for Fiona etc, but once you get to a certain station in life, your friends and family want for very little. 

If that doesn’t work, Plan B. Whimpering, a little bit of crying. Try to make it seem like you are actually the victim and that by not accepting your apology, they are doing something wrong. Eventually, normally out of sheer social embarrassment, order is restored.

Of course, when I betray my friends trust, it is normally contextualised within a few indiscretions in a drunken stupor. Not a calculated, savage backstabbing for profit.

@qq_barney asks: Hi Tim, wanted to know your thoughts on the Ivy branching out of Soho with the market grill franchise. Is this Martin Luther esq unlocking for the people or a bastardisation of a British Icon?

Barney,

One of the worst days in my life was finding out that Ottolenghi was expanding.

A second restaurant (then a third, now a fifth), outside of Islington.

A franchise, practically McDonalds at that point.

As ever, it was my mind, my brilliant mind, which relieved my anxiety.

An epiphany.

Was it…déclassé to export Britain across the world? To paint Africa British red, end bride burning in India and introduce the Aboriginals to Cricket?

No. I mean, obviously it was bad, but still, it did not ‘cheapen’ Brand Britain.

The colonisation of London by Ottolenghi, spreading braised eggs from Turnpike Lane to Croydon, is basically a good thing.

Through good food, I truly believe we can improve the moral and spiritual character of the Native White-Working class.

So, the Ivy wants to open up, punch above its weight, do something for Brand Britain and improve our soft power abroad?

It has my blessing.

@hack_daniels asks: OK to fly to Newquay a few weekends or so this year as long as we offset them with the same amount of Eurostar/TGV trips when normalcy returns? Settle this one for the Montessori walking bus volunteers, please, Tim.

The Climate Emergency is terrifying.

And I support the strictest possible measures to combat it. Stopping, for example, poor people having lots of children, driving in London, or taking Ryanair flights across Europe.

But in this era of Brexit, and this Climate Crisis, who stands up for comfort?

Me.

Sure, for most people, a few additional hours on the train is not much of a compromise if it saves the environment. For most of them, it just means spending more time scrolling gormlessly through Facebook videos on a carriage instead of the sofa in front of the Television.

But not I. 

For every hour I save by travelling by plane, is another hour of bliss at home. Frosted glasses of white wine in the garden on Summer evenings. Long dog walks on the Heath. Stopping at the Spaniards for some Crispy Pork Belly.

Radio, turned to four. Long, luxurious baths. Dark Chocolate Ginger biscuits and Earl Grey tea.

Here’s my attempt at a compromise between climate and comfort.

Only the rich really enjoy life enough to make the hours saved by fast travel worth the carbon emissions.

So slap on the taxes. £700 for a flight to Edinburgh? Fine by me. Meat ‘licenses’? Sign me up.

I’m not one for ideology. But of all convictions, my firmest is this:

No change is permissible, if it makes my life less worth living.

@Scarface___1983 asks: As a FPBE advocate, for the first time I’m beginning to lose heart in the project.

Tony Blair/Adonis.

What say you?

Brexit.

Five years have passed, since that poisoned, wretched day.

Sometimes, Tony, sometimes it brings me hatred to see another person’s smile. In our racist streets, in the poorly stocked supermarkets and the rotting strawberry fields. What is there to be happy about? 

In Brexit Britain.

Tony, we Remainers must remember that there is a certain dignity afforded us by persecution.

On no continent on Earth have the children of Abraham been safe. Not from the Mad Pharaohs, Braying Mullahs or the Bonkers Sultans.

Almost two thousand years passed between Bar Bokhba, and the foundation of the Modern State of Israel. A lesson in persistence for us all.

Tony. We shall build ourselves a New Jerusalem, right here in Britain.

One day, even if it is a couple of thousand years from now.

A country of diversity and inclusion. One which invests in young people, Mental Health Services and communities. Strong on defence, while championing human rights abroad.

It might not be in our lifetime.

But we must keep the flame of our people flickering.