Life is happening to people like you and I right now.
Our communities are in trouble. Crime is running out of the door from police control. People cannot afford to feed themselves or meet the basic costs to live. There is genuine discontent growing amongst us and fear that if there ever were any adults in politics, they have long since left the room and deserted us all.
Without good leadership and with no sign that we will ever have any again, we are wrestling with the reality that we are now on a doom loop of politically driven mayhem, that bears no relationship with what public representation and democracy was intended for.
Everything we are experiencing would seem desperate enough, even without the fear-driven narratives that seem set to create drama from the chaos that we are already in. Narratives that are being pushed by everyone with a platform – and not least of all, the politicians themselves.
Whilst talk for those politicians and activists without power or responsibility is certainly cheap – because they have the excuse of not being able to act, as the power to do so isn’t currently theirs, there is no longer a defining line between the words of those who can act or rather could if they wanted to, and those who don’t have any ability to’.
We have now reached the rather troubling point that anything that will be good for us, the People and that we might not only want and need, but should be able to expect our public representatives to do for us, automatically, will not get done.
Indeed, it seems to be the case that anything that would helps us, will not help them, nor do anything to get them out of the quickly deteriorating situation they are in, and which they caused themselves by playing their part in creating all of this mess in the first place.
The fact that we now have a government openly and contemptuously doing whatever it likes and whatever may serve its own purposes or that of whoever pulls their strings aside – and whenever it is not taking drastic measures to try and ward off the now inevitable collapse – is only worse than what we experienced under the Conservatives (and Lib Dems) over 14 years. And what was quietly inflicted upon us even before then, because they were at least covering up what they were doing – even if their actions were ultimately manipulative and hiding everything in plain sight.
The uncomfortable reality that awaits us all as we begin to wake up to the victimhood that so many of us are not yet even aware that we are within, is that the situation has now become so bleak, in terms of policy options that will actually benefit the British People, that politicians are now squabbling over little more than what they would do if the circumstances were different for them. All the time knowing, somewhere deep down, that the policies they are touting will be impossible to deliver now or after an election.
It simply will not matter who is elected and placed ‘in power’ – because there isn’t a political party, group or movement that we can see or hear from within the public sphere today, that has either the leadership capable or that has the motivation and ability to now do everything that will be necessary to do so, whilst all the time working with the very clear risk that what is necessary will mean they will not be elected again, next time.
Not unlike Labour, who we can be fairly sure had at least some MPs within its 397 sitting today who really would have liked to do all the things that they said on the doorsteps running up to 4 July 2024, any party or group that takes power at the next General Election – whenever that might be – will be faced with the same seemingly impossible quandary to address.
They will have to decide whether they either drop everything meaningful that they have promised and keep bobbing along, all the time hoping that everything doesn’t completely collapse before they leave. Or alternatively, face up to reality and get ready to lead, through the complete chaos and systemic collapse, that they will only temporarily succeed in putting off by wrecking everything anyway, and buckle down for what is going to become an exceptionally challenging ride for us all.
The reasons and excuses may well be different for every politician who is now hiding from the truth that we all face – or why they may be actively embracing or even facilitating it. But the best that they can now appear to do, is argue over the ideas for policy and change and who owns them, even though it is likely that these will be things that they will never actually be able to do, because they are all too afraid for themselves to do so.
Whilst Reform – who have this week reached a staggering 35% in the polls – can seemingly print out policy gambits with a restless public apparently hanging on every word, a good example of the level to which the ability of the political apparatus within the UK has actually fallen was well illustrated by the Conservative Leader this week suggesting that Tory Policies on tackling the immigration problem had been stolen by Farage who had been ‘copying homework’.
One uncomfortable truth we should perhaps all be reflecting upon, is that if the politicians and those who would replace them were genuinely interested in doing whatever it may be that will be best for us and for the UK, they would not care nor consider who owns, enacts or leads any policy that is going to answer the questions and deliver the outcomes which are genuinely best for all of us. Indeed, they would actually be thrilled that any policy or action was being taken that would be in the best interests of us and the UK and be happy for whoever is in power to be using it. Wouldn’t they?
Another will surely be that this reality does indeed paint a picture that makes it very hard to question the increasingly obvious similarities between every party option that we have or will have available to us at the next election being fundamentally so similar, that in practical terms – and that means delivery and outcomes, all the political options that we currently have are basically all the same.
Yes, this means that the downward trajectory will not change.
Given everything else that we have to consider too, including the very establishment-esque support that Reform are now attracting – is the only change we will notice is that the speed of the collapse will increase, whilst the outcome of this massive leadership void may arrive much sooner (if it has not by then already done so).
Whilst it may be easy to understand and empathise with the desire and wish of so many and to believe that Reform – or indeed whoever or whatever comes next, will actually do whatever they say, there is little evidence to suggest that they or anyone who we could vote for at the next General Election actually will deliver on anything that will help those who need it.
Indeed, the track record that we can now see where Reform have been ‘running’ councils across the UK since May, suggests that in terms of what they will able to achieve and deliver, that isn’t just passed back into the hands of government officers, who are a big part of today’s problems, they are wholly out of touch with the reality they face at every level; have no real plan or understanding of what change will really take; and are therefore well and truly out of their depth.
The expertise and willingness to lead us and do everything necessary to get things done certainly exists amongst the population.
But even good leaders will need to take every step available to take everyone with them.
Amongst what we have available today, there is no politician or party doing one damn thing that has even a distant hope of achieving the kind of societal cohesiveness that will be required through what will be the very challenging times ahead.
Adam Tugwell 
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