What I've Been Reading Recently

Another quarter has been and gone, and to mark the occasion here's the customary round up of all the books I've read.

The Quatermass Experiment by Nigel Kneale
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata
The White Mountains by John Christopher
The City of Gold and Lead by John Christopher
The Pool of Fire by John Christopher
No Way Out by Tim Shipman
To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway
Empire of Two Worlds by Barrington J Bayley
The Sorrows of Young Werther by JW Goethe
Jupiter by Ben Bova
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Out of the Silent Planet by CS Lewis
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and But Gentlemen Marry Brunettes by Anita Loos
The Breaking of Northwall by Paul O Williams
Zofloya, or, The Moor by Charlotte Dacre
The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story by Stephen R Donaldson
Waiting for the Barbarians by JM Coetzee
Walk to the End of the World by Suzy McKee Charnas
Mine Boy by Peter Abrahams
Doomtime by Doris Piserchia
They Shoot Horses, Don't They? by Horace McCoy
A Billion Days of Earth by Doris Piserchia
Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth
The Eyes of Heisenberg by Frank Herbert
Candide by Voltaire
Radix by AA Attanasio
Super-Cannes by JG Ballard
Incandescence by Greg Egan
Journal of a Wife by Anais Nin
The Gap into Vision: Forbidden Knowledge by Stephen R Donaldson
The Woman Who Walked into Doors by Roddy Doyle
Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert A Heinlein
Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
Swimming in the Dark by Tomasz Jedrowski
Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Robert Maturin
Killer Planet by Bob Shaw
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Cosmonaut Keep by Ken MacLeod
Infinity Gate by MR Carey

Some corkers stand out from this humongous list. Top reads include Mine Boy, the first black South African novel to command mainstream critical attention. Life was hard in the townships, but Abrahams's work is not depressing in the slightest. Au contraire a sense of creeping menace competes with a huge heart that beats throughout the book. A strong recommend. Anita Loos's double bill of short novels was great fun, and the inclusion of contemporaneous cartoons from its magazine serialisation give it a lot of character. You don't have to be into Sex and the City 1920s-stylee to enjoy it. Melmoth the Wanderer is representing as the gothic novel to end all gothic novels. A ridiculous set of nested stories, murder, the Inquisition!, dungeons, melodrama, visions of hell, soul-selling - it has the lot. Very entertaining but for me, The Monk remains the sub-genre's unconquered pinnacle.

Looking into the SF, the two Gap books and its sequels by Stephen R Donaldson don't get much coverage. And now I know why. Take an unimaginative space opera with space pirates, space cops, corrupt officialdom, and gross aliens and use these tired tropes to dress up a nasty little story about the repeated rape, physical abuse, and gaslighting of a traumatised woman. The titular 'gap' of the series refers to the hyperspace jump technology of the universe, but it might equally apply to Donaldson's absence of a moral compass. A gross and unnecessary entry in the SF canon. Much better was Williams's The Breaking of Northwall, the first in the post-apocalyptic Pelbar cycle. It's North America 1,000 years from now. Swords are as advanced as weaponry gets, but social change is afoot and a new renaissance and industrial revolution beckons. It's not a masterpiece but it is well written and entertaining. Also good fun were the two juvenile reads from this quarter. Bob Shaw's Killer Planet can be breezed through in no time: an uncomplicated mystery that, funnily enough, centres around a planet that kills people. The other was the Heinlein. Yes, four books in and I've found a likeable novel by him. Citizen of the Galaxy is a meditation on social responsibility. It has some thrills and spills for its intended audience, but winds up as a courtroom drama. Not the choicest of narrative directions, but it's Heinlein so there you go.

Quick shout out for the third entry from "Shippers" Brexit quartet. Its predecessors were pacey and entertaining, but No Way Out was a bit of a slog. The detail is impeccable, and he does his best to make dry negotiations interesting, but even as skilled a writer as he cannot polish up the dullest of subjects. And finally there are the Tripods trilogy: a set of books I should've read decades ago. They're dated in a boy's own where-are-the-women way, but not horrifically so. A shame I didn't get round to writing about them.

What have you been reading recently?

A Proxy and a Meat Shield

Missile strikes lighting up the sky over another Middle Eastern city. But this was not Beirut or Khan Yunis. It was, instead, Tel Aviv. Almost a year of massacres, indiscriminate bombings, enforced starvation, assassinations, and attacks that included targeting an Iranian consulate and an explosion in Tehran, Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu has brought a hail of fire down on his country's head. But for all his genocidal bloodlust, he's not the sole author of this disaster.

Since the 7th October attack by Hamas, virtually every Western power has granted Netanyahu a free hand in the region. The gut wrenching butchery of Gaza had, until recently, garnered nothing but a whisper of protest from European governments. The attacks on Yemen and Syria, the flagrant military actions on Iranian soil, and now the invasion of Lebanon give the impression of a rabid Israel that has slipped the leash of its sponsors. Britain announces a limited moratorium on some weapons it exports, and is castigated by their ungrateful recipients. Germany appeared to slow the flow of arms several days ago, and later denied it was doing so to avoid an establishment backlash. And while Western leaders did their love, love, peace, peace thing at the UN last week Netanyahu took to the stage and peddled the racist rubbish that Israel was waging a war for civilisation. He effectively announced that Iran was next.

The truth is, the West and above all the United States have not reluctantly gone along with but are actively aiding Israel. A fact that is obvious from even a cursory glance at mainstream media sources. Its war aims, the "neutralisation" of Gaza and destruction of Hamas, reducing and, if possible, defeating Hezbollah, and bombing targets in Syria are American war aims. They want Iran's regional influence pared back, and to see it punished for the assistance it has rendered Russia in its pointless Ukraine quagmire. And the State Department, loyally followed by Germany, France, and the UK, have gone about it in the most underhanded way.

The spectacle of a ranting, if not crazed Netanyahu has suited his sponsors very well. With every outrage committed, the Biden administration has cast themselves as the helpless observer from afar. The briefings are on "words exchanged" behind the scenes, of "warnings" and "concerns" that Israel's recklessness could provoke a wider conflagration. While this charade has gone on, Israel has been inundated with Western munitions, and there is ample evidence its intelligent assets and special forces have variously assisted the IDF in their operations. In other words, what we have seen this last year is a reversion to Israel's historic role in the region: as a proxy and as a meat shield for interests beyond its borders. The appearance of Netanyahu's autonomy hides Western complicity. Indeed, it gives every impression that the relation of force is the other way round. That Tel Aviv says jump and Washington and London ask "how high?" The utter cynicism of faux concern and studied helplessness feeds antisemitic conspiracy theories. It positions Netanyahu and/or Mossad as behind-the-scenes puppeteers. And American, German, and British governments are fine with this because they escape immediate responsibility for atrocities committed while seeing their interests served.

At any moment, Joe Biden could have stopped this. He could have picked up the phone to Netanyahu and said no and halted the slide to a generalised Middle Eastern war. Israel is militarily and economically dependent on the good will of the world's hegemon, and would have had a hard time carrying out their colonial campaign of ethnic cleansing and murder by itself. They have done so with American blessing, and it's at America's behest that Israeli bodies will now start piling up.

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Five Most Popular Posts in September

The summer is over and the nights are drawing in. But regardless of the changing seasons this blog remorselessly marches on. Here then are the five hot shots that hit the spot in September.

1. Confessions of the Gravediggers
2. A Note on Authoritarian Modernisation
3. Residual Welfare Vs Social Security
4. A Fondness for Freebies
5. Why Scrap Winter Fuel Allowance?

Surging ahead of the pack was my take on the "unexpected" revelations that the Labour right were more interested in ditching Jeremy Corbyn than winning an election. A reminder that these people can't be trusted to do anything except for what might advance their careers. Our runner up was a look at Keir Starmer's statecraft. What are the principles guiding his wooden managerialism? What is he trying to achieve? Third place was a result of this strategy: their successful assault on a remaining prop of universalism. While it's time for pensioners to cut their cloth, no such restraint applies to Labour's leadership. A good chunk of the month and no mean amount of political capital was expended defending Starmer and co.'s right to accept all the gifts. And coming in last was another look at the cut to Winter Fuel Allowance.

Labour have monopolised the traffic, so let's look at something else. Sticking with politics, we nip across the Channel to take in Macron's anti-democratic shenanigans. And leaving this most ignoble of pursuits entirely, I choose to bat some disaster SF your way.

October's here, and appropriately enough for Hallowe'en month the horrors are abroad at Conservative Party conference. I have a sense this blog will return to its specialist subject. I can feel a piece on a recent science fiction novel in my bones too. But undoubtedly there will be fall out aplenty from Rachel Reeves's budget. As we're not allowed nice things, who's going to get clobbered? As ever, if you haven't already don't forget to follow the occasional newsletter, and if you like what I do (and you're not skint), you can help support the blog. Following me on Twitter and Facebook are cost-free ways of showing your backing for this corner of the internet.

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Thus Spake Rosie Duffield

"Since the change of government in July, the revelations of hypocrisy have been staggering and increasingly outrageous ... How dare you take our longed-for victory, the electorate's sacred and precious trust, and throw it back in their individual faces and the faces of dedicated and hardworking Labour MPs ... Forcing a vote to make many older people iller and colder while you and your favourite colleagues enjoy free family trips to events most people would have to save hard for - why are you not showing even the slightest bit of embarrassment and remorse?"

Thus spake Rosie Duffield, in her resignation letter to Keir Starmer. Absent is the obsequiousness that usually marks the form. It has the anger, if not the ranting quality of a furious Facebook status update. Yet that makes Duffield's letter effective. She has let her shock hang out and loosened her rage at the ride Starmer has taken the Labour membership, his MPs, and the electorate for. Duffield has channelled the disappointment of the Starmerist base into an unparliamentary intervention, boiling over with the sentiments that that had simmered on the back benches.

Last year Labour had the opportunity to ditch Duffield. She was always going to be a thorn in Starmer's side because of her transphobic campaigning. No matter how many times Wes Streeting restricts trans health care, or the genuflections Bridget Phillipson has made to "genuine concerns" about gender identity in schools, it would not have been enough for Duffield. But that she has attacked the leadership's integrity, and used the sort of hard language never employed by the soft left, is a surprise. Who can deny the substance of her argument? It's true. Starmer and friends have an entitlement complex to the trappings of office, and how they see nothing wrong with it is a reflex of the Labour right's self-importance. This isn't helped by Starmer's foolish efforts to emulate Emmanuel Macron, who has deliberately cultivated himself as a figure above politics unbeholden to the petty concerns of the little people. Look where that's got France.

Everyone knows Duffield is right and that Starmer is duplicitous. Especially those closest to Team Starmer, who are now unionising to fight wage cuts. What a way to show gratitude to one's underlings. While the media have indulged freebiegate and left the bigger scandal well alone, the damage to the new government's standing is real. The defences of Starmer's troughing, from it "didn't cost the taxpayer a penny" to the Prime Minister needing a wardrobe allowance was arrogant and dismissive, and has gone down as you might expect. Note to the Labour leadership. The poll bounce after a conference speech is supposed to go the other way.

Because Duffield is a cause celebre for transphobic centrists, her resignation will feed the divisions in Starmer's base that were present well before he took office. And for those loyalists who lost no time trying to fob freebies off as unimportant, they are bound to discover how objectionable and appalling Duffield's "gender critical" politics are. You can anticipate the ministers on the politics shows saying she has been "unhappy" with the party for some time and this is sour grapes because she was passed over for a job (Duffield's letter is annoyed at the new no-marks who've been promoted over the time servers). None of this is going to rescue the situation. Starmer and co. are exposed as out of touch troughers while telling everyone else to tighten their belts, and what Duffield has done is opened up a division in the party that had been papered over. We're not even three months in yet.

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Quarter Three By-Elections 2024

This quarter 311,570 votes were cast in 111 local authority contests. All percentages are rounded to the nearest single decimal place. 31 council seats changed hands. For comparison you can view Quarter Two's results here.

* Reform's comparison results are based on recomputing their tallies in Others over the last quarter/year
** There were nine by-elections in Scotland
*** There were three by-elections in Wales
**** There were 13 Independent clashes
***** Others this month were Alba (133), Crewe First (109), Freedom Alliance (178, 25), Heritage Party (115, 30), Independence for Scotland (236), Liberal (125, 58), Party of Women (19), Scottish Family Party (53), TUSC (550,  178, 83), UKIP (148), Workers' Party (460, 300, 274, 166, 52), Yorkshire Party (634). Comparison results are now based on the last quarter's result with Reform's totals subtracted.

A huge vote for Labour and very little to show for it. It's too early to say if disaffection with Starmer's performance in office is behind this sudden about turn in fortunes, but to see the Tories come out of a quarter that saw their worst election defeat ever with a net gain of councillors has to constitute some sort of record. For those who pay attention to such things, it was a good while before Labour got on the front foot following the suspension of by-elections during the Covid lockdown period.

Elsewhere, the Lib Dems aren't going to be chuffed with their results. But the Greens continue to make steady progress, and making their debut on the quarterly round up is Reform. A small vote share seeing as they've only ramped up their local operations this last month, but they netted their first by-election gain in July. Unfortunately, provided they do start taking local party building seriously their vote share can only go up for the time being.

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Local Council By-Elections September 2024

This month saw 55,602 votes cast in 38 local authority contests. All percentages are rounded to the nearest single decimal place. 15 council seats changed hands. For comparison with August's results, see here.

Party	Number of Candidates	Total Vote	%	+/- Aug	+/- Sep 23	Avge/ Contest	+/- Seats
Conservative	37	12,789	23.0%	+2.1	-7.2	346	+4
Labour	39	15,968	28.7%	-0.6	-3.1	409	-7
Lib Dem	34	8,655	15.6%	+4.1	-5.3	255	+1
Reform*	16	2,823	5.1%	-1.5	+4.4	176	0
Green	30	6,602	11.9%	+2.4	+7.9	220	0
SNP**	4	2,439	4.4%	-5.3	+0.8	610	+1
PC***	2	119	0.2%	-1.9	+0.2	60	0
Ind****	27	5,627	10.1%	+1.4	+2.0	208	+1
Other*****	7	580	1.0%	-0.5	+0.2	83	0

* Reform's comparison results are based on recomputing their tallies in Others over the last month/year
** There were five by-elections in Scotland
*** There were two by-elections in Wales
**** There were six Independent clashes
***** Others this month were Alba (133), Crewe First (109), Heritage Party (30), Party of Women (19), Workers' Party (166, 52). Comparison results are now based on the last month's/year's result with Reform's totals subtracted

I've bowed to the pressure of the polls. Because Reform have started taking council by-elections more seriously and standing decent numbers of candidates, for the first time since the eclipse of UKIP an extreme right party has returned to the table of parties. Explainers above about how their past performance has been tracked are in the notes above. This will carry on until this time next year.

Elsewhere, this cycle of by-elections have been terrible for Labour. Yes, it's a mix of local factors plus displeasure at Winter Fuel cuts won't have done their performance much good (remember, pensioners are more likely to turn out for council by-elections). But we need to temper this with the overall picture. At the general election dozens of Labour councillors won seats and will be vacating them in fairly short order. As it's more their seats that are up for grabs than Tory-held seats, it's expected that their "punishment" will look more severe than it actually is. Still, dropping so many councillors so quickly and seeing the Tories win back seats already is weird. Yet it isn't if you keep the amateur hour that is freebie gate, winter fuel, and letting rumours about scrapping single persons' council tax discount circulate without rebuttal are taken into consideration.

Elsewhere, solid results for the Liberal Democrats and the Greens and a respectable outing for Reform, which amounts to their biggest monthly by-election intervention so far. Not, however, their best result at this level.

October will be another ludicrous month for by-elections with over 50 slated. Depending on what's in the budget, Labour could well find themselves even more out of pocket come Hallowe'en. And if they are, it will all be thanks to the shoddy tricks they've played on the electorate.

3rd September
Swale, Priory, LDem hold

5th September
Camden, Camden Square, Lab hold
Camden, Kentish Town South, Lab hold
Camden, Kilburn, Lab hold
Cheshire East, Crewe West, Lab hold
Manchester, Baguley, Lab hold
Merthyr Tydfil, Bedlinog & Trelewis, Lab gain from Ind
Redcar & Cleveland, Longbeck, Con gain from Lab

12th September
Cambridge, Romsey, Lab hold
Gateshead, Bridges, Lab hold
Hackney, London Fields, Lab hold
Hackney, Stoke Newington, Grn gain from Lab
Milton Keynes, Bletchley East, Lab hold
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, North Jesmond, LDem hold
Norfolk, Freebridge Lynn, Ind gain from LDem
North Ayrshire, Arran, Lab gain from Con
North Norfolk, North Walsham Market Cross, LDem hold
Tower Hamlets, Bow East, Lab hold

16 September
Gedling, Bestwood St Albans, Con gain from Lab

19 September
Bromsgrove, Sidemoor, LDem gain from Lab
Cornwall, Falmouth Penerris, Lab hold
Hartlepool, Burn Valley, Lab hold
Huntingdonshire, St Neots Eatons, Ind gain from Con
Stockton-on-Tees, Fairfield, Con hold x2
Westminster, Harrow Road, Lab hold
Westminster, West End, Con gain from Lab
Worthing, Marine, Con gain from Lab

24 September
Mid Suffolk, Thurston, Con gain from Grn
Waverley, Godalming Binscombe & Charterhouse, Con gain from Lab

26 September
Denbighshire, Rhyl Trellewelyn, Con gain from Lab
East Staffordshire, Stretton, Con hold
Herefordshire, Credenhill, Ind hold
Highland, Cromarty Firth x2, Ind hold, LDem hold
Highland, Inverness Central, Lab hold
Luton, Barnfield, LDem hold
Luton, Wigmore, LDem hold
Perth & Kinross, Perth City North, SNP gain from Lab
Perth & Kinross, Strathallan, LDem gain from Con

Time for a Left Alternative?

No time for a proper post today as I'll be in London speaking at the first of the Party Time? series of discussions this evening. If you can't make it or fancy a preview, my contribution will draw heavily on the below. This was first published by Labour Hub earlier in the week.

A Conference for a Party that has won its second highest seat tally ever should be an occasion for celebration. But the partying mood appeared absent from Labour’s annual gathering. The week-long feeding frenzy on ‘freebiegate’ would have come as a shock to Keir Starmer supporters who bought into the ‘Mr Rules/grown-up-in-the-room’ image that has been crafted for him. It would have sent a shiver down the dozens of backs of newly minted MPs in marginal constituencies, whose success lies partly in painting their defeated Tory opponents as corrupt and incompetent.

But there are other worries too. The thinness of Labour’s vote demonstrates the shallow relationship ‘Starmerism’ has with the country at large, a level of indifference that saw Labour’s support dip beneath 10 million votes for the first time since 2015. What should be a moment of supreme confidence is shot through with unease.

This is not helped by the results mustered by challenges to Labour’s left. The returning of four MPs – one at Labour’s expense – and almost two million votes suggest the Greens are poised to be a serious problem for Labour during this Parliament. It’s doubtful the Turning the Green tide event at Conference last Sunday would have calmed many jitters coming from this direction.

But what could amount to a bigger and possibly existential problem is the possibility of a viable left alternative. The victory of Jeremy Corbyn and the unexpected wins by four more anti-war Independents, plus very strong results in some places for other left-wing indies and George Galloway’s Workers’ Party could be a foretaste of difficulties to come. The suspension of seven Labour MPs for going against the whip on lifting the Child Benefit cap also creates an (on paper) parliamentary nucleus around which a new united left party could be built. Are the stars aligning for a viable left alternative?

The space is there, so it behoves the extra-Labour left to make the move. Which is what will be debated at the upcoming series of Party Time? public discussions about left strategy under Keir Starmer’s Labour. But it’s not as simple as simply declaring a party, as the last 25 years of left electoral experiments have taught us. The central question for any new party project has to be ‘What is it for?’

The answer for some of the left is straightforward: a combat party capable of taking on the capitalist class and building working class capacities to the point where a revolutionary crisis breaks out, which the party can then prosecute to victory. For others, it’s the creation of a broader party that is simply about challenging Labour from the left. But here, there are issues around whether it should exist to ultimately displace Labour, or act as a pressure group to keep it honest. These are the three strategic positions likely to dominate debate in a new formation and could easily cause it to fall apart in short order, or bring about an unsatisfying fudge that could enshrine permanent factionalism.

Then there are questions about how it should be built. Jeremy Corbyn has argued for a community-focused orientation. He says the sinking of deep roots across Britain is the prerequisite for building something lasting. The truth of this, he suggests, was shown in his own victory against the Labour machine.

The problem is that while this would be ideal, it overlooks how Corbyn’s example is based on his being the MP for Islington North for 41 years, and hamstrings any effort to make the most of the opportunity now in front of the left. The alternative is some central direction, by someone or a collective with a national profile to take the lead. The seven suspended Labour MPs are best placed to do this. Their views are more in tune with public opinion than the Labour leadership’s, and it’s unlikely most will get the whip back soon.

But this too comes with problems. How many, if any, want to take this lead? Do they think their political priorities are better served by remaining left Labour MPs, and therefore seeking readmission to the PLP? And if any do want to take this role on, does this not replicate the priority Labourism accords MPs over the rest of the party, no matter how formally democratic this left alternative sets out to be? And if this is the case, what role in an electoralist party for those who are involved but are committed to a revolutionary project of some sort?

There are no easy answers to these questions, but they have to be grasped, debated, and decided upon, if the extra-Labour left want to build a new party. The gap in Britain’s political ecology is open, and the left have an opportunity to fill it. But the moment is time-sensitive and if it doesn’t, the Greens almost certainly will. What’s it going to be?

Anything but a Banger

Keir Starmer gave a conference speech typical of him. There were the nods to "service". There was the (unfounded) election triumphalism because we "changed our party". There were gestures to better things in the future, tempered by acknowledging the hard road ahead. Working people, "country first, party second", the boilerplate Starmerism was present virtually unchanged from last year's speech. In fact, the stand out moment - and what it will be remembered for - was his demand for the return of the sausages. An unexpected moment of levity in a scripted address that was anything but a banger.

What was striking about his speech was as if the last week didn't happen. This would no doubt concern Andrew Marr, who argued that Starmer should have apologised for the wardrobes of gifted clobber, the free tickets, and the takings ups of hospitality enjoyed by the leadership. There was no concession that anything was amiss, nor was there likely to be. Starmer has long nursed a penchant for the spoils of office. To his mind he believes he deserves it, and he's not going to say sorry for something he isn't sorry for. Never apologise, never explain is the first rule of right wing Labour politics. Jittery journos like Marr can carry on jittering because, they believe, the public don't care. A silly assumption, because they do.

A vague plan for Britain got a second airing, which via the framing of building a "decisive state" singled out Starmerism's two enemies. The first was the phantasmic Labour left, which was repeatedly dismissed and traduced by comparing his changed Labour to the "comfort zone" of irrelevance. The heckler who took him to task over his continued support for Israel was contemptuously dismissed with a "This guy has obviously got a pass from the 2019 conference." What japes to laugh off complicity in a genocide. Despite the evisceration of Labour's left by fair means and foul, Corbynism is a shade that weighs on their brain like a nightmare. If the "magic grandpa" has cast a spell, it's one over the Labour right's imaginary.

The other enemy was "populism". Corbyn was lumped in with Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage, who were denounced - albeit not by name - as peddlers of "easy solutions" and unrealistic promises. Contrasting his managerialist project with pie-in-the-sky politics, "we know where that leads" he said. He almost verged on the passionate in attacking the far right, though this was limited to "racist thugs" and praising the communities that came together to rebuild after the riots. He's still lagging behind the King on this one, and refusing to take on the Tories, the Farageists, and the right wing talking heads who've encouraged and excused it.

Starmer announced one new policy: guaranteed accommodation for former armed forces personnel, so none will end up sleeping on the streets. He also outlined the ambition of extending this to care leavers and victims of abuse. And if you're not one of Starmer's worthy homeless? Let's just say the silence was symptomatic. But there was a weird moment when Starmer waxed lyrical about everyone having the right to access the arts, music, and pursue their creative passions. He gave the impression of working himself up to an announcement about guaranteeing children's access to artistic subjects and venues, many of which are either on the brink or have gone under. But it never went anywhere, except for an anecdote about Starmer's first trip abroad with the Croydon Youth Orchestra.

In all, the court media loved it. The New Statesman said this speech showed "the real Keir Starmer". If it did, then we can conclude the Prime Minister has more waffle than Birds Eye, is tone deaf to public grumblings about freebie gate, and despite what was supposed to be an electoral triumph is haunted by his predecessor still. It wasn't a bad speech by Starmer's standards, but it wasn't the one he needed to give. If the customary post-conference polling bounce doesn't materialise, it's not difficult to see why.

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Calvin Harris, Ellie Goulding - Free

Have written something for elsewhere this evening, so your filler is ... dancefloor filler. Let it never be said that the All Solid Disco eschews new tracks because it was better in the olden days. This summer has abounded with plenty of decent tunes and here's one to close off the sunny weather with. Easily Harris's best tune since One Kiss and Goulding's since Russ Chimes's superb remix of Starry Eyed. Play it.

Another Strange Death of Liberal England?

Labour's bum note of a triumph in July found its echo in the Liberal Democrats' performance. 72 seats was their best ever performance under modern branding, and you'd have to go back to December 1923 when Herbert Asquith re-entered the Commons with 158 MPs to find them doing better. But the blight in the Lib Dems' garden was the strength of support. 3.5m votes was down on the widely-panned 2019 result. Therefore, while there was much gaiety and partying at conference last week the more thoughtful have been asking why they didn't do better. Especially when taking the circumstances into account.

To be fair to the Lib Dems, within a week of the general election the naysayers were getting published on Lib Dem Voice with refreshing outbreaks of honesty. For example, Chris Whiting wrote that the haul of formerly Tory-held constituencies creates a pressure for the Lib Dems to move right to keep hold of them next time round. He argues this would be a mistake as the Lib Dems are seen as a centre left progressive force by the public and, by implication, the Tories were turfed out in fall cognisance of this fact. Instead, if the party wants to improve on 72 seats between now and the next election it has to stay where it is and swoop in as Labour lurches rightward. A point made here enough times.

Going from his leader's speech, Ed Davey partly disagrees. He also means to carry on as the Lib Dems have been. I.e. No peddling back on the positions the party has taken, and the emphasis on adult social care stays. Nor is there going to be a lurch to the left to intersect with those appalled by Labour's cutting and grasping. Davey has set out his doctrine of "constructive opposition". I.e. Using his two weekly questions at PMQs to cast the Lib Dems as a grown up, critically supportive opposition that isn't out to score points. A lofty ambition in the yah boo sucks pantomime of the Commons, so we'll see how long that lasts. But what Davey is banking on is that when the new Tory leader takes office, they're going to carry on in the same stupid and arrogant way that cost them the election and, by default, the Lib Dems will look better and be poised to take even more seats off the Tories next time. Worth nothing the party is still second placed in more Conservative held than Labour-held seats. And because the mood of British politics has apparently turned toward sensible sensiblism what with Keir Starmer's election, the Lib Dems can profit.

It's a coherent strategy, and one that might navigate the pitfalls of turning too left or too right. It could work. The dream of the Lib Dems coming second and forming the official opposition is far from dead. But it's not without difficulties. Not moving left leaves the field open to the Greens and possibly other left wing forces (if they get their act together), giving both of them a leg up. In the case of the Greens, this is especially dangerous to Lib Dem fortunes because not only is it winning over the more radicalised sections of the new working class, the last two years' worth of council results and winning Waveney Valley and North Hertfordshire from the Tories demonstrates a capacity to eat into the vote that, elsewhere, was predisposed to support the Lib Dems. And this despite the Greens standing on a radical left manifesto.

The opportunities that lie ahead for the Liberal Democrats are pregnant with dangers. It might be that Davey's strategy pays off. His constructive opposition shtick does take more seats from the Tories next time, and sitting Lib Dem MPs largely retain their seats thanks to a parliamentary term of hyper local campaigning. But eschewing the politics might let their Green rivals chip away at the foundations of the decent seat tally the party has built. A reminder that moments of opportunities are also moments of crisis, and this is one that could lead to another strange death of Liberal England.

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