Friday 15 March 2024

The exercise of forgiveness

 

As Michael Gove demonstrated yesterday, defining ‘extremism’ isn’t as easy as some might think. He, presumably, thinks he’s got it right, although the range of views and arguments deployed against him suggests otherwise. But there was also another aspect to what he said yesterday when challenged about extremism coming from the direction of his own party’s supporters. Sir Paul Marshall, the man behind the increasingly misnamed GB ‘News’ which gives a platform to the swivel-eyed entryist tendency in the Tory Party, has something of a record when it comes to making or supporting extreme statements about Islam, LBGQT+ issues and migration. Gove attempted to defend him by referring to his record of ‘educational philanthropy’. The underlying issue here is whether, and to what extent, ‘doing good’ in one field is enough to get a free pass to support and promote hate speech in another.

It's not the only recent example. The Leader of the House of Commons defended the Science Secretary over her rash and unwise decision to accuse an academic of Islamism, which led to a law suit for libel, by referring to an entirely unrelated matter as an indicator of her ‘character’, as though that could somehow excuse using public funds to ruin someone’s reputation and pay the associated legal costs. And then, of course, we had Gove himself calling for ‘Christian forgiveness’ for a man who donated £10 million (plus a currently unconfirmed extra £5 million) because he’d apologised. (The idea that ‘forgiveness’ is a ‘Christian’ trait and therefore implicitly not shared with those of a different persuasion is a pretty telling remark and might even be regarded an ‘extremist belief’ in itself.) They haven’t (not yet at least) gone as far as Trump who told his chief of staff that “Hitler did a lot of good things”, although he apparently didn’t spell out what they were. (Things like locking up or even executing political opponents, invading neighbouring countries which didn’t spend enough on defence, and taking what some might see as a ‘hard line’ on people that he didn’t really think were German would all fit the Trump playbook, but all that’s off the point here.)

Maybe it’s true that there are very few people who never did a good thing in their lives, and that we should consider the whole rather than just a part, but the question is one of balance. Which people should be shown forgiveness (whether Christian or not), and which should not? And for which sins? The very cynical might think that the de facto deciding factor is just how much help someone has given to the government or governing party in terms of cash donations or merely a platform to spout their ideas. The more common or garden cynic might see it as more generalised – those who promote the governing party’s ideas are allowed to get away with more than those who don’t. It doesn’t take a lot of observing to note that apologies by Tories seem to be assumed to carry more weight than apologies by members of other parties. Genuine atonement and contrition are – or should be – about more than a mumbled half-apology and a donation to Tory coffers. But there – I’m just showing the extent to which I’ve fallen for the extremist idea that people should, as a general rule, avoid hate speech in the first place rather than atone for it after the event.

Thursday 14 March 2024

Living dangerously

 

It was, apparently, Emo Philips, an American actor and comedian, who came up with the joke that, “When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realised that the Lord doesn't work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me.” But it is the English Conservative and Unionist Party which has decided to adopt a variation on this approach when it comes to dealing with racism and misogyny. Instead of trying to eliminate racist language by Tories, their response to the outrageous (and, to date, undenied) remarks attributed to their biggest donor has amounted to saying that a rich Tory donor can say whatever he likes as long as he apologises afterwards. And pays the party enough money. It all seems a bit reminiscent of medieval popes selling indulgences.

The linguistic acrobatics being performed by those who want to keep hold of the tainted £10 million are a wonder to behold. The miscreant himself claims that there was no racist or sexist intent in the words used as though the words ‘black’ and ‘women’ were meaningless and added nothing to what he said. Then there’s the claim that he can’t be racist because he does business in Jamaica. On that simplistic basis, neither were the slave owners; they were simply businessmen trying to turn a penny or two. The suggestion by number 10 that his words were wrong, but he’s given an apology for ‘being rude’ and we should all just move on sit oddly against a background where the government is determined to ‘crack down’ on anyone who breaks the Conservative consensus about what it is to be British. It invites us to consider that being racist is an entirely acceptable part of their definition of British values as long as an insincere apology is issued later by anyone whose words somehow leak into the public domain.

The reluctance to part with £10 million, especially after it’s already been spent, is, I suppose, understandable for a party obsessed with the financial value of everything, but principled it is not. Faced with the obvious car crash which was coming his way the moment the words leaked out, Sunak had two political options open to him. The first was immediate condemnation, accompanied by the return of the cash. Decisive, even if untypical, action would have wrong-footed the opposition, but the story (as a source of political damage to the Tories) would have gone away after a few days. Sunak seems incapable of instant reaction, so his default option was the second. That is to delay reacting as long as possible, and then try to brazen it out in the belief that the news media would move on. Consciously choosing the second option inevitably brings a third option into play, but it’s one that politicians only ever fall into by accident. Starting out by trying to brazen it out and then buckling under pressure is the worst of all in political terms: not only does it look weak, unprincipled, and indecisive, it also concedes that the original decision was wrong and the opponents were right all along. And it looks at least possible that pressure from his own side from people who have a genuine and entirely legitimate fear of being brought down along with him may yet push him that way. Living dangerously may be a lifestyle choice for some, but for Sunak it’s entirely accidental.

Monday 11 March 2024

Officially unofficial

 

The reports over the weekend that Boris Johnson has been engaging in some ‘unofficial’ diplomacy by meeting the president of Venezuela raise a number of questions. The first, but probably least important, is who paid for the private jet to take him there and back? His spokesperson said that the travel was privately funded and that neither government contributed to the cost. That might be true (although we know from other recent news that the UK government is not averse to funnelling funds through third parties to disguise the source). The one thing of which we can be certain is that Johnson didn’t pay himself. He is a man who has achieved the minor financial miracle of earning ludicrous sums of money for doing very little, getting other people to pay for everything he wants, and still being perpetually broke.

A more significant question is how the meeting came to be arranged. I don’t know whether Johnson and Maduro had ever met before, but they don’t exactly look like the sort of bosom buddies who would pick up the phone and agree to meet for a conversation which ‘sources close to the former PM’ (according to the Sunday Times) described as “one-way traffic”, with Johnson laying down the law to Maduro. So who initiated the meeting between a busy head of state and a disgraced former PM with no role in foreign policy who just happened to be on holiday a mere 1,000km away? Was it Johnson: “Nicolás, old chum. Boris here. I happen to be staying in the Dominican Republic just up the road from you, and I have a private jet at my disposal for the day. Why don’t I nip down to give you a little lecture about democracy and your role in the world?”. And if that sounds unlikely, consider the alternative: “Boris, mi amigo. A little pájaro tells me that you are staying just an hour and a half away from here by plane. Why don’t you blag a private jet from one of your rich friends for the day and nip down to give me a little lecture on democracia?”. I don’t buy either.

And then we’re told that Lord Cameron of Chipping Bollocks didn’t know anything about it until Johnson texted him en route: “Dave, old boy. Boris here. Just flying down to Caracas to give that Maduro chappie an earful about his responsibilities to democracy and the world. Thought that the Foreign Secretary might want to know about it. Toodle-pip!” None of it adds up – it’s far more likely that there was some discussion at a diplomatic level to set up the meeting, implying that both governments are keen for a restoration of some sort of normality in relations. If Maduro really thought that Johnson had absolutely no status with the UK government, why on earth would he ever have agreed to meet him? He can’t have been expecting a friendly fireside chat. In short, this ‘unofficial’ visit looks about as unofficial as a tax demand from HMRC. And if Cameron really didn’t know about it sooner, then someone in his department has been freelancing big time.

But, if it was an official 'unofficial' visit, that brings us to the biggest question of all. Who, in his or her right mind, thought that it would be a good idea to entrust a disgraced former PM, who is also a compulsive liar with a predisposition to saying the first thing that comes into his head, with acting as the conduit for sensitive discussions with a foreign government? The chances of him accurately relaying the UK government’s position to Maduro, and then accurately relaying Maduro’s response to the UK government are not exactly high. He's much more likely to deliver an insult or three in the belief that it’s just banter and good humour. And whether Cameron knew about the visit in advance or not, is it credible that the current PM would not have known that his predecessor but one was being deployed on an ‘unofficial’ diplomatic mission of a certain delicacy? Jobs for failed ex-PMs is becoming a Sunak speciality. Next up? Theresa May as head of an initiative to welcome new citizens? Liz Truss as next head of the Office for Budget Responsibility? If he’s given up on all hope of turning things around, Sunak can at least spend the next few months having a laugh.

Saturday 9 March 2024

Cutting out the middleman

 

The six week suspension handed to one of Plaid’s Senedd members has provoked a comparison with the position at Westminster – in similar circumstances, a Westminster MP would be facing a recall petition and a probable by-election, but there is no such sanction available in the case of this list MS. It’s a valid question, but the suggestion of instituting a similar provision for the Senedd seems to be based on the English constitutional fiction underpinning the Westminster process, which is that people vote for an individual, not for a party. In the case of list members, the vote is unquestionably for the party. And whilst introducing such a provision for members elected on a closed list is not impossible, it does rather look like twisting the system, when there is actually a very much simpler process available.

The recall process is comparatively novel in the UK’s system, and to date there have only been five instances of a petition being called. The first of those was in Northern Ireland, where none of the UK parties operate, and in a constituency which was not seen then as being particularly competitive – it was widely assumed that the DUP would win anyway. That petition failed to attract the necessary support of 10% of the electorate. In all other cases, the 10% was reached, and it doesn’t take a genius to work out why. I doubt that there is a constituency anywhere, no matter how apparently popular the transgressing MP might be, where a determined opposition party or parties could not find 10% of the electorate wanting to get rid of their MP. We can probably, therefore, take it as read that once a petition is called, it is overwhelmingly likely to be successful.

To date, only in one instance has the transgressing member stood in the subsequent by-election (although in another case, the member managed to arrange for his party to select his girlfriend, a situation which led to a remarkable lack of external support for her candidacy). The one who did stand again was defeated in the by-election. Indeed, the idea that an MP who has either been convicted of a criminal offence or else suspended by his or her fellow MPs for a serious breach of parliamentary rules would be presented by his or her party as a suitable person for re-election is a strange one, a form of political madness. Certainly not something likely to be repeated any time soon.

So, regardless of the objective of the recall principles (that the electors should be given the opportunity to call for a by-election and that the individual should have the opportunity to stand again), the electors are always likely to say yes to a by-election, and the party is always likely to disown the previous member and select a new candidate. It is, therefore, in practice if not in principle, a process where a member in breach of the relevant rules ends up being expelled from the parliament and replaced by a new member who may or may not be from the same party. In which case, instead of trying to come up with a complex set of rules for list members to face by-elections, why not simply cut out the middleman, and declare that, on conviction (in the case of criminal acts) or suspension from the parliament for more than a specified period (in the case of a serious breach of the parliament’s rules or standards), the seat becomes vacant and the member is replaced through the normal process which would apply in the case of death or resignation? For a constituency member, that means an automatic by-election, avoiding the cost, time and effort of a petition, and for a list member, it means the appointment of the next eligible member on the relevant party’s list. It’s both simpler and more rapid than the current process, which seems to have been designed (with a remarkable lack of forethought) to maximise the chance of the transgressing member being returned to the club.

Thursday 7 March 2024

Insanity precedes destruction

 

Imagine the glee in Tory HQ yesterday when the Chancellor sat down. Not only had they produced a budget which depends heavily on entirely fictitious cuts to public spending in future years, they’ve also stolen Labour’s clothes on two tax increases which were designated by Labour to fund a whole load of policies. Given Labour’s ‘cast-iron’ commitment to a stupid and unnecessary fiscal rule, it means that an incoming Labour government will be obliged to identify the cuts which Hunt has declined to identify (in the certain knowledge that it won’t be him making them) and obliged by a compliant Tory media to explain how they will now fund the various things for which the cash has now been given away. I’m sure that the backroom staff will be celebrating the success of their cunning plan to make things as difficult as possible for the next government. How clever they must have thought themselves.

So clever, in fact, that they even issued the press with a helpful briefing list of all the things which Labour will not now be able to do. The thing is, though, that most of the items on that list appear likely to be generally popular. Telling people how clever the Tories have been by sabotaging funding for more NHS appointments, more NHS dentistry (a service which has reached crisis point), school breakfast clubs, home insulation and so on doesn’t immediately strike me as being the cleverest of moves. Preventing Labour from pursuing unpopular policies is one thing; preventing them from pursuing popular ones is quite another. And boasting about it looks like a form of political insanity. Still, as the saying goes, “those whom the gods would destroy…”.

Wednesday 6 March 2024

Pétards have their uses

 

A pétard was, apparently, a small bomb, used mostly for breaching the gates and walls of fortifications. When improperly used, it could result in the user blowing him or herself up, or being ‘hoisted’ into the air. But the word originally derives from the Latin for fart, so being ‘hoist by your own petard’ really means being propelled in an unwanted direction by an expulsion of internal wind. The latter, more literal, definition seems, somehow, more appropriate for the situation in which the Tories have found themselves in the last week. Twice.

The first was the fire being directed by some Tories at the Office for Budget Responsibility at the way in which its interpretation of the numbers is restricting the ability of the Chancellor to ‘adjust’ the numbers in order to deliver a fantasy tax cut in today’s budget. Those with an attention span longer than that of a gnat will remember that establishing the OBR was a cunning plan by George Osborne to fix financial orthodoxy into law by having an ‘independent’ group of experts consider proposed budgetary changes and report on whether they complied with that orthodoxy. It was to act as a deterrent to any Chancellor who thought that he or she could simply fiddle the figures. It was intended, of course, to nobble the Labour Party if it should ever be re-elected – the financial orthodoxy was very definitely a Tory version of orthodoxy. It was never designed to constrain the actions of a Tory Chancellor, yet that is exactly what it is now doing. Truss found a way around this inconvenient obstacle by declaring that her mini-budget was not a budget (Sunak is not the first Tory to attempt to redefine facts) in order to avoid the requirement for an OBR assessment but, as things turned out, the absence of that assessment was an even bigger problem as those in the financial markets asked themselves just what Truss and Kwarteng were trying to hide.

The second is the backlash from the extremists in the Tory Party to the proposals by Sunak to try and outlaw extremism. They have realised something that Sunak obviously did not – that in outlawing extremism he may end up criminalising a fair chunk of his own party. Some might call it a form of poetic justice, others might see it as the law of unintended consequences. Either way, it highlights the extent to which the PM doesn’t understand the implications of his own words and actions – let alone how far his party has fallen through the looking glass. Back in the days of John Major, it might have looked like a deliberate ploy to rid himself of some of the bastards in the cabinet, but from Sunak it just looks like incompetence and an astounding lack of awareness.

So, that loud ripping noise you might hear from time to time is nothing to worry about. It’s simply the explosive release of intestinal gases from a Tory Party busily ‘hoisting’ itself into oblivion. Almost reassuring.

Monday 4 March 2024

Creating new business opportunities?

 

Entrepreneurialism is something which just about everybody is in favour of, but which is actually quite hard to define. In terms of new enterprises, some of the key elements include identifying a product or service which people want and finding a new way of fulfilling that want such that the product or service can be readily sourced and sold at a profit. And often, looking at the history of some of the most ‘successful’ entrepreneurs, it involves sailing close to the wind in legal terms or even slightly crossing the line. The more successful the business, the more likely it is that a blind eye will be turned, especially if exposing any transgressions might embarrass the relevant authorities.

If that’s a reasonable working definition, how do we respond to the news that the Home Office has been issuing thousands of care work visas to companies who provide no care and have no facilities to provide care anyway? Criminal conspiracy or daring (might one even use that term so beloved of the current government, ‘buccaneering’) entrepreneurialism? The companies appear to be properly incorporated, and the visas they obtain, once issued by the Home Office, entirely valid. And they have an obvious financial value when sold on to others. One thing that is entirely predictable is that, when any rules or regulations change, there will be those who will seek out any business opportunities which might be presented as a result. In this case, the government’s changes to visa rules have opened up an entire new industry – trade in legitimate, Home Office issued, visas.

It is by government decision that there are virtually no checks performed by Companies House on the incorporation of new companies. It might be a decision taken to avoid having to employ civil servants to perform checks, or it might be deliberate – the UK Government seems to be rather proud of how easy it is to set up a company in the UK. And it’s another government decision (again, probably taken to avoid employing civil servants to do the work) that the Home Office performs few checks on the legitimacy of applications for visas. And given the government’s announcement that the total number of civil servants will be arbitrarily reduced to the number who were employed prior to the pandemic, we can be certain that there will be plenty of other circumstances in which basic checks will not be performed.

Every such failure creates a loophole which someone, somewhere, will find and exploit in order to turn a profit. Whether we call that someone a dastardly criminal or a buccaneering entrepreneur is, ultimately, an open question: the difference between the two isn’t always as obvious as one might think or wish. Arbitrary reductions to the civil service will even make it easier for those working in the new market to avoid or evade tax. The failure to operate proper checks on the issue of visas might initially look like mere government incompetence. But when similar failures are repeated across a range of functions, it ends up looking more like deliberate policy. As we ‘know’, civil servants are a ‘burden’ who add no real value to anything, they just apply ‘red tape’ and ‘bureaucracy’ which stand in the way of enterprising individuals. Blaming those individuals might be easy, but they shouldn't be the only target.

Saturday 2 March 2024

Sunak channeling Nelson?

 

The Prime Minister seems to be more than a little exercised about the result of the Rochdale by-election, but equally short on solutions, unless you count a bit of performative and ritual condemnation and yet more action against protests. Whilst it’s true that the by-election was hardly the finest hour for any of the traditional parties, and that most people would probably agree that ‘extremist’ is a reasonable description of Galloway, the simple fact is that, under the rules of the game, Galloway won the election. It’s called democracy and, since democracy is about debate between different viewpoints, it doesn’t always produce the results that some of us might want. Of course, in one sense Sunak is displaying traditional ‘British’ values; in this case those of Nelson as he ignores the extremist takeover of his own party. He seems blissfully unaware of the parable about motes and beams.

Would Galloway still have won under a system of proportional representation? It’s hard to be certain, but with 40% of the vote going to Galloway, the second and subsequent choices of eliminated candidates would have had to break very decisively against him for the result to change. That isn’t the end of it, though – had there been a system to allocate the votes of eliminated candidates between those remaining at each stage of the count, that might have attracted a higher turnout. ‘What if?’ is an interesting but largely academic pursuit. What we do know is that Tory and Labour alike prefer to retain the system because it enables them to win an absolute majority on a percentage of the vote lower than that achieved by Galloway (meaning, incidentally, that his constituency victory has rather more democratic legitimacy than the parliamentary majority won by either Labour or the Tories in five of the general elections in the last half century).

Most of the time, the UK’s electoral system works in a way which favours a two-party contest, with other parties being seen as ‘also-rans’. However, sometimes circumstances are such that the system can end up favouring an alternative, for example if the support for that alternative is heavily concentrated geographically. The rise of the SNP to dominance (a dominance which would have been far less sweeping under a properly proportional system) is one example. Galloway’s victory, in what are probably utterly unique circumstances in Rochdale, is another. In railing against the outcome, either Sunak is too dim to realise that he is really railing against the UK’s electoral system, or else he is trying to lay the groundwork for a further assault on that system to rig it even further in favour of his own party. His words were so empty of content that it’s really hard to tell.

One thing on which I can agree with Sunak is that we face a serious danger from extremism. It’s just that the extremism emanating from his own party worries me more than any other sort, because that extremism is actually in power and eating away, from the inside, at the traditional values which its proponents claim to espouse.

Friday 1 March 2024

Raising taxes to pay for tax cuts

 

There is, or should be, something rather surreal about the reports that Jeremy Hunt is considering raising taxes in order to, er, pay for tax cuts. Even more so when it becomes clear that the two tax increases he’s considering are part of Labour’s planned financial plan, and that he and his colleagues have roundly condemned them both, repeatedly. Some might see it as an example of redistribution in action – although taking money from one group of well-off people in order to give it to another group of relatively well-off people (who might as a result feel bribed into voting Tory) is not exactly what most of us mean by the term ‘redistribution’. For an added twist, it seems that one of the attractions of implementing these two Labour policies is that it would prevent Labour from implementing other Labour policies – which Labour were planning to use the money raised to implement. By raising the money himself in advance and then giving it away, Hunt’s cunning plan is to force Labour to say which other taxes they will raise to pay for policies which will thus be left unfunded, and thus expose Labour as a tax-raising party.

There is, of course, an implicit assumption in this that everyone will see tax cuts as being preferable to providing decent public services, an assumption which hasn’t exactly been validated by some recent polling. But then, Hunt probably doesn’t mix a great deal with those who are most dependent on those decent public services. Perhaps the most surreal part of all is that Hunt’s cunning plan has been aided and abetted – not to say directly facilitated – by the stupidity of the Labour Party in committing not to reverse any tax cuts announced by the Tories, even when all concerned know that those cuts are going to be predicated on using new money raised as well as assumptions about unspecified cuts to services at some future date which have been built into the government’s five year plan.

It is a monumental act of self-harm by Labour’s foot-shooting tendency which has managed to convince the leadership that the arbitrary fiscal rules which they themselves have invented have some magical status which makes them unbreakable. It’s an act of stupidity which won’t stop them winning the election (although we should be careful not to rule out the possibility that they will find some other way of making even more holes in their own feet in the coming months) but merely mean that they can’t do very much once they’ve been elected, other than try and implement Tory policies with a little more competence. It’s fair to say that competence in a governing party has been more than a little under-rated recently, and a dose of it might be welcome, but those hoping for real change as a result of a change of governing party are likely to be disappointed. Rapidly. The biggest danger is that they will simply open the door to the new English Nationalist Party (although they probably won’t call it that) which is likely to rise out of the ashes of a merger between the Tories and Reform after the election. We really do need to make a quick exit from the dysfunctional state which the UK is becoming.

Thursday 29 February 2024

Cracking down on crackdowns

 

One of the key weapons in the armoury of a desperate politician is to announce a ‘crackdown’ on something or other. It’s not unique to the Tories – I seem to remember a certain T. Blair announcing ‘crackdowns’ on various perceived sins – although it’s more likely to come from a government which has the power to do something than from an opposition which does not. It was Sunak’s turn yesterday, with his pledge to ‘crack down’ on mob rule. Announcing a crackdown always sounds forceful and macho – although it doesn’t exactly play to Sunak’s visible strengths. Or even his invisible ones. The most useful crackdown would probably be a crackdown on the announcement of crackdowns.

‘Mob rule’ isn’t something which is easily defined either – at least, not by someone who wants to prevent people blocking the streets protesting about climate change or war whilst also joining in with those who use their tractors to block the streets in protest against revisions to farming subsidies. Whilst I would describe neither as ‘mob rule’, in Sunakland it seems that either there are good mobs and bad mobs or else the definition of a mob is such that protests against a Labour government in Wales are magically excluded. And that, of course, is part of the point – it’s really divergence from his own views on which he wishes to crack down.

I’ll admit that I’m not sufficiently familiar with the details of farming finances and subsidies to judge whether the Welsh Government’s proposals are as bad as some farmers are making out. What I do know is that any Brexit promise to maintain the level of farm finance was as false as all the other promises, and that a reduction in funding inevitably leads to replacing previous schemes. George Monbiot argued yesterday that the differences between the English schemes and the Welsh schemes are not as great as they have been presented by some, and that “The main difference is that in Wales, the offer for farmers is better – with more consistent payments and a smoother transition from the old system”. If that were true, it would mean that Sunak was busily supporting farmers who are arguing that a deal better than that which his government has offered isn’t good enough. An entirely normal level of honesty from the current UK government. I suspect that the truth is more nuanced. Farming subsidy schemes are complex and any change means, especially if accompanied by an overall reduction in funds, that some farmers will inevitably lose out, even if the Welsh scheme is indeed better overall than the English equivalent. And that will undoubtedly impact rural communities in Wales, for whom the farming industry is still a key factor.

The easiest ‘solution’ would be to ensure that the pre-Brexit levels and methods of funding were maintained, a matter which is wholly in the hands of one Rishi Sunak. Joining in with protests which are effectively against his own government’s actions is taking a leaf straight out of the playbook of Welsh Labour members in relation to hospital and school reorganisations, so there isn’t a lot of moral high ground for Drakeford et al in this. Although constrained by Westminster decisions on funding, the Welsh Government does have some room for manoeuvre on what is still, officially, a consultation process. I really hope that they will listen carefully and use that room for manoeuvre. It’s doubtful, however, that they will be able to please everybody and still achieve the aims that they’ve set out for themselves. Calling on Sunak to intervene and over-ride whatever is decided in Wales (as some of the protesters have done) is counter-productive for an industry which has more direct influence over what is decided in Cardiff than it does over what is decided in London, and is, instead, playing to the agenda of people whose aims go way beyond reforming farming subsidies.

Sunak’s apparent ‘support’ for Welsh farmers is a double-edged sword, and his real agenda is about party political advantage and undermining Welsh democracy. If English farmers start protesting with tractors in the centre of London, he’ll soon enough be ‘cracking down’ on the ‘mob’.