Monsters and Demons
During the Leveson Inquiry the press was on its best behaviour - as lots of politicians, various celebrities and the odd real person trooped in to give their evidence on what needed to be done - to drive up standards of behaviour.
One person's evidence that stuck in my mind was that of former Labour leader - Gordon Brown - who made a passionate plea for the press to stop 'monstering' and demonising politicians.
Gordon spoke of his experience of dealing with the situation in Afghanistan where, as Prime Minister, he 'couldn't do right for doing wrong' - whatever he did he got in in the neck and as far as he was concerned the press, or at least certain sections of it, were out to do him down.
Now what I thought at the time was that this all sounded a bit rich coming from Gordon Brown - because the Labour Party while in government never seemed to mind a bit of demonising and monstering - so long as this was happening to the 'other side'.
Which brings me to the recent press coverage of David Camerons' decision to spend some time on a pre-arranged family holiday - having dealt with the immediate fall out surrounding the barbaric murder of Drummer Lee Rigby.
For his trouble a picture of David Cameron with his wife, Samantha, was splashed on the front page of The Mirror (a Labour supporting paper, of course) - alongside a photo of the grief stricken Rigby family who were visiting the site in Woolwich where the young soldier was brutally killed.
Now that vile front page from The Mirror required a response - and I have read nothing better on the subject than this artticle by Dan Hodges - a former Labour adviser who writes a regular blog for The Telegraph newspaper these days.
Chillax, people, and let the poor Prime Minister have a holiday
By Dan Hodges
We need to make up our minds whether we want politicians to be more like us, or not
In his wonderful history of Seventies Britain, Seasons in the Sun, Dominic Sandbrook tells the story of how, in the midst of the IMF crisis, an exhausted Denis Healey and his wife snatched a couple of days away on the west coast of Scotland.
The Healeys booked into a small hotel outside Ullapool but, Sandbrook recounts, “scarcely had he laid his head on the pillow than the telephone rang downstairs. So he trooped back downstairs, wearing a raincoat over his pyjamas, to the phone in the hall. It was the police, calling with the unhappy news that there had been a bomb threat against him and Special Branch were on their way from Inverness. Healey had barely got back to his bedroom before the phone rang again, so he trudged wearily back downstairs. This time it was the Treasury, reporting that sterling had come under renewed pressure. A third call inevitably followed from the Bank of England, asking for approval to spend £150 million to defend the currency.”
In his own memoirs, Healey described this nocturnal coming and going as “a night of French farce”. If Seasons in the Sun forms part of David Cameron’s holiday reading, he will no doubt empathise with the former chancellor’s plight. And having empathised, he could be forgiven for saying to himself “screw it” and booking himself and his family into their Ibiza hotel for another month.
The Prime Minister can’t win. On Wednesday, in the wake of Lee Rigby’s murder, he cancelled his trip to Paris, flew home and convened a meeting of the Cobra emergency committee – and was attacked for doing so. He slavishly “cleared his diary”, plunged into his favourite Cobra bunker and summoned the mightiest in the land to “co-ordinate a response”, mocked the Guardian’s Simon Jenkins. Cameron had been “too quick on the draw”, complained David Livingstone, a former Downing Street security official.
Then on Sunday, having managed the crisis, expressed condolences to Drummer Rigby’s family and delivered what by common consent was a well-judged plea for calm resolve in the face of the renewed terror threat, David Cameron flew out with his family on a long scheduled half-term break – and was promptly attacked again.
“This is the picture of holiday bliss that will infuriate relatives of butchered soldier Lee Rigby”, stormed the Mirror, under a picture of the Prime Minister engaged in the shameless act of drinking a cup of coffee. “Surrounded by sun, sea and sand in Ibiza, David Cameron looks like he hasn’t a care in the world – as the country he is meant to be running lies in the grip of terrorist turmoil following the horrific murder.”
The Sun, which kicked off the storm, claimed: “MPs are appalled that he has jetted off amid spiralling tensions following the murder of soldier Lee Rigby in Woolwich, south-east London, on Wednesday and the arrest of two suspected Islamic extremists.”
Even this newspaper was criticised by some readers for juxtaposing a picture of the Camerons on holiday with a scene of grieving relatives at the murder site in Woolwich.
It’s true that a couple of MPs – none of whom are ever likely to be bothered by the burdens of high office themselves – have expressed some ritualistic outrage, although it should also be noted that Labour’s justice spokesman, Sadiq Khan, sensibly rejected the criticism.
Even by the febrile standards of Westminster, the attacks on David Cameron over the past 48 hours have been ridiculous. He is in Ibiza, not on Mars. He has constant access to a sophisticated and secure communications network. What do people think is going to happen? “Prime Minister, I’m afraid there’s a serious terrorist incident under way.” “Not now. Fat Boy Slim and Driis are up next.”
One day we’re going to have to make our minds up. Do we want politicians who are a reflection of ourselves, or do we not? For what its worth, I don’t. I’m pretty certain the nation’s problems will not be resolved by installing me in Downing Street to grapple with them. Nor am I especially taken with the idea that good governance is simply an extension of bar-room philosophy, and if only we could find a dozen Nigel Farages to sit round the Cabinet table, all would be well.
But nor do I think we will better served by our leaders if we insist on grinding them into the dust. The chillaxing jokes are good fun, but a normal day for David Cameron involves him rising at five in the morning and completing his last box at 10 o’clock at night. The guy hasn’t had a proper holiday since Christmas, nor a trip abroad with his wife and children since last summer. Last week he switched on his television and saw a man, his hands dripping in blood, holding a meat cleaver and calling out his name. The Prime Minister deserves a break.
It’s fashionable at the moment to claim we are experiencing a crisis of faith in our politics because the politicians do not understand the people. Maybe. But perhaps another part of the problem is the people don’t really understand their politicians. In one breath we criticise our leaders for being drunk on ambition, and hungry for power. Then in the next we criticise them for too readily abandoning the corridors of power in favour of their Balearic sun loungers.
We condemn them for not understanding the needs of ordinary families. Then we denounce them for wanting to spend some precious time with their own families. We vilify for them for their obsession with presentation and spin. And then we castigate David Cameron for “sending the wrong message” by leaving the country in the wake of Woolwich.
In fact, there have been several prime ministers who could have done with a lot more chillaxing, not less. Baroness Thatcher’s four hours’ sleep ended up doing her and her country few favours. Gordon Brown was another prime minister whose premiership could have benefited from more hot rays, cool cocktails and fewer midnight briefings.
Yes, our politicians know the rules of the game. In a democracy they cannot expect the love and empathy of a grateful people. This is the United Kingdom, not North Korea. But there have to be some rules, all the same.
In the wake of the expenses scandal there was nationwide outrage at the thought of MPs setting their own expenses and level of pay. So IPSA was established to deal with MPs remuneration. Earlier this month it published its recommendation; a £10,000 increase in MPs’ salaries – at which point there was more national outrage.
Yes, David Cameron has not helped himself – or the political classes – by surrounding himself with a perceived Etonian elite, or cutting the top rate of tax at time when he was calling on others for an act of national sacrifice. But let’s not kid ourselves. If David Cameron appointed an East End Pearly King and Queen to his inner circle, people would still complain “They’re so out of touch. They just don’t get it.”
Maybe they don’t. But we don’t either. There are no Iron or Teflon politicians. They are flesh and blood, just like the rest of us. Of course we can pretend they’re not and demand they are more like us. Or is it less like us? Sooner or later, we’re going to have to decide.
