23rd September
Today was the day of a budget-that-is-not-a-budget but a fiscal event. A bit like a war that’s not a war but a special military operation.
I was in the kitchen making a coffee when Kwarteng was making his announcement in parliament. For a minute I thought Boris Johnston had returned from the dead, or wherever he happens to be on holiday. Kwarteng sounded pretty pompous. I know you have to play to the gallery, ‘it’s a new era for Britain’ etc.
It’s hard to look at some of those ministers on the front bench and not character assassinate them.
Kwarteng I could easily see as the evil clown from Stephen King’s IT (I only say that because I am reading IT and IT is quite scary).
Liz Truss is definitely Chuckie (I relented and ordered the Funko Pop Chuckie figure from Amazon; it can sit in front of the computer screen as I type this; £23, that’s just under £100 left of what I will get from the tax changes).
Coffey is the cigar chomping Wilhelmina Bunter; she is to the NHS what bags of sugar are to our local Weightwatchers group.
Mogg is too obviously a figure out of a Dickens novel. But which one? Were he Tiny Tim, under NHS reforms, he would be dead long before now. Mr Gradgrind? That’s being unfair to capitalists.
Braverman is definitely the headmistress from Grange Hill. I could imagine her standing on the Dover shore telling immigrants to go home (all 30 000 of the poor souls, and that’s up to September of this year alone).
Jenerick (is he still a minister? He was on TV in the week welcoming the return of British men who had fought in Ukraine and been captured by the Russians. Given that Saudi Arabia claimed credit for arranging their return – none of them are journalists – that’s a two edged story for the news to cover) I could see as a benign, ineffective, Wille Wonka.
I need to get out more.
Russian men are fleeing the country (their country not ours) because they don’t want to be conscripted. The response in some western countries is not to let them in. That seems a bit self-defeating.
Why does anyone shop in the COOP. I know I have said it before. Staff are great; prices are stratospheric. I popped up to pick up a parcel from Very. If you are after some big ticket items, Very prices are great and the payment options are really good.
Very did not pay for this plug, honest.
One Pagers 