The reported reality that some UK Labour activists are in the US helping the campaign of Kamala Harris in the final period before the poll, should not be news. Labour has over many elections helped and advised Democratic campaigns. Bill Clinton made an appearance at a Labour Conference as a ‘CLP delegate’.
The fact that it is news is a news story in itself but not what this post is about.
Of course Farage has also been helping the Trump campaign but other Reform UK Ltd activists probably havent, not least because Trump has quite enough Whackos and Weirdoes helping at it is.
One instance of the Labour tradition is the occasion when Tony Benn spoke at a Democratic Socialist Organising event titled ‘Eurosocialism and America’. B in Washington in early December 1980. It was just after George H Bush had beaten Walter Mondale in that year’s Presidential Election.
Also speaking at the event were Willy Brandt and Francois Mitterand.
The DSO was a socialist organisation associated particularly with Michael Harrington that worked with and around the Democrats from 1973-1982 when it merged with another organisation.
As Benn noted in his Diary the event appeared to get no publicity in the US and probably not much in the UK. It was just seen as politics are usual and normal. Benn describes the event in his diary as ‘significant’
With media chuntering about what in fact is traditional Labour support for the US Democrats (the media won’t recall that Bill Clinton addressed a Labour Conference as a ‘CLP delegate’) YouGov have produced a poll about UK support for Trump.
Unsurprisingly there is little Labour and LibDem backing. A majority of Tories also give Trump a swerve underlining that of the Tory leadership contenders Jenrick is not in tune with Tory voters.
No surprise to find a majority of Reform UK Ltd voters backing Trump, but it does underline that out there the constituencies for the Tories and Farage do overlap but are very much not the same
THE CRYPT DOOR SWINGS OPEN ON THE SCARIEST HALLOWEEN BEARD POLL
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, which campaigns against irrational prejudice against the hirsute, has said that the crypt has creaked open on the Scariest Beard of Halloween 2024 poll with the first round of the poll now open.
Neil Oliver and JD Vance won the first round of voting and go through to the final. Round Two is now open to determine the two Scary Beards who will join them
The title, awarded each year on October 31st, takes a wry look at Halloween festivities by identifying the scariest beard in the public eye. The winner is likely to win by the narrowest crack of a squeaky floorboard.
The BLF does not generally believe that beards are scary, a view promoted by generations of pogonophobes.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, facial hair is part of Halloween tradition. We aim every year to subvert some of the pogonophobia that lies behind that, while looking in a light hearted way at ‘scary’ beards.
Voting for two preliminary rounds and a Final opened on 26th October
It was of course a stunt. The McDonalds was not open to the public.
A reminder too of the wider context. The McLibel Two were at the SpyCops inquiry in London over the last few days. Police infiltrated their campaign against McDonalds & spied on their lawyer-Keir Starmer
Richard Holden forme Tory Party Chair has held a Westminster Hall debate in the Commons about pie and mash shops seeking to give them protected status.
Holden was the MP for North-West Durham (now Labour held) and was parachuted into Basildon and Billericay at the July Election. His majority is 20.
I’m a lifelong fan of pie and mash and given the number of outlets appears to have been declining for some years- certainly in north-east London- Holden’s call to give them protected status seems reasonable. Possibly the only reasonable thing he has ever said.
His description of pie and mash however is worthy of Private Eye’s Pseuds Corner
Traditional pie and mash is an artisan food. The pie and mash and liquors are freshly made, using authentic family-owned recipes that have been passed down through generations like precious heirlooms. They are something that in Italy or France, let us say, would be instantly recognised as being worth celebrating and preserving, and I will say more on that broader point a little later.
Senator Lidia Thorpe led a protest against King Charles and the Monarchy on Monday. Anyone familiar with Britain’s colonial occupation of the country will understand she had a very good argument.
There was another feature of the protest that struck a chord with the history of anti-imperial protest going back to Victorian times
Protest at Monarchy, a British tradition. The 1897 Jubileeting the tone which he describes as ‘disrespectful and insulting, it gloated over royal tragedies’. Yet Reynolds’s a Sunday newspaper sold 300,000 copies a week.
St Pauls Cathedral, the church of Empire, was the scene for Queen Victoria’s Jubilee ceremony on 22nd June 1897. Earlier in the day Victoria had been at the central Telegraph Office in St Martins Le Grand to send a message worldwide to her subjects. It was the equivalent to sending an e-mail or arguably posting on Twitter.
Victoria had not always been a popular monarch. After the death of her partner Albert the Queen had become reclusive and as often seems to be the case the activities of some of the Royal children were an embarrassment. By the early 1870s a strong Republican tradition had developed with the formation of working class republican clubs. The leadership of this movement was not entirely from the left but was to be found with radicals like Charles Bradlaugh and elements of the Gladstonian Liberal Party. They were certainly not consistent opponents of monarchy or imperial power but it symbolised a class divide in society and Victoria was its figurehead.
What of opposition in 1897 itself?
Reynolds’s News, as noted a best-selling Sunday Paper, which dated back to the Chartist period had a strong record of support for Republicanism and Opposition to the monarchy. It’s issues record some of the opposition there was in 1897.
It reprinted an anarchist leaflet that refers to Queen Victoria as a ‘fat old lady’ and end by arguing that despots should go to hell. Entertaining though it is, its publication in Reynolds’s probably reflected its maximum impact.
Elsewhere the paper reported events. A bonfire built to celebrate the Jubilee on the highest point of the Cotswolds was set alight before the appointed day, and the authorities sought to arrest the miscreant who had done it. Meanwhile in Bristol, the Mayor had invited local trade unions and friendly societies to join a Jubilee procession. They all refused on the grounds that the Jubilee was not something that felt they were included in.
Reynolds’s returned to the fray with its post-Jubilee edition on 27th June 1897.
It reported the sermon of a Durham vicar TJ Dent from Haslington who concluded that the Bible showed that the existence of the monarchy- a ‘worn out fraud’ it was called was delaying the Kingdom of Heaven.
An Editorial on the events noted ‘the Jubilee celebrations with their curious mixture of real enthusiasm with sickening flunkeyism’. It concluded that ‘at last the ghastly farce is over. The Jubilee show has passed’ and argued that ‘Radicalism and servility do not go well hand in hand’. It finally suggested that ‘the final great lesson of the Jubilee is that the people now have to fight wealth’
The detail of the Jubilee day however is perhaps as interesting as the protests. It was a fine sunny day as the Royal procession made its way from Buckingham Palace to St Pauls and afterwards to the poorer areas of Borough via London Bridge.
There were crowds in some places and police horses and troops were used to control numbers. Some who had camped out overnight for a view of the Royal Party complained that they had been pushed into side streets by the police as crowds grew.
However the areas where crowds gathered were quite limited and in most places there were few bystanders. Reynolds’s speculated that many may have preferred to avoid the occasion or leave London for the day, even though in this long before TV age the only way to actually see the event was to attend in person. Another possibility that has a strong contemporary echo is that police closed off roads surrounding the Royal procession so that only those who had arrived very early could get a glimpse.
The fall out, reported in Reynolds’s of 4 July 1897 made the point. A businessman successfully applied to Southwark Council for a return of fees he had paid to erect a stand for spectators in Westminster Bridge Rd. There had it seems been very few takers. In an even odder report several traders applied to a judge for permission to cut up 500 pairs of stilts they had been given to sell for firewood. The owner had disappeared, the police had banned the use of stilts to watch the Royal procession and very few people were interested anyway.
Yet the main opposition was not at the centre of Empire but at the periphery. There were anti-Jubilee protests in Dublin organised by socialists including James Connolly which led to rioting. The Irish nationalist MP Redmond proposed an amendment to the Loyal Address to the Queen outlining the destruction her reign had caused in Ireland back to the Potato Famine and before.
There were also significant protests in India. The Editorial of Reynolds’s on 4 July 1897 had reflected that ‘there is more food for reflection in the condition of India than in the inanities of Jubilee No.2’. It reported a flypost in Poonah that stated ‘none but demons would celebrate a Jubilee when the famine, earthquake and plague prevailed’. Several British soliders were shot and injured during the Jubilee period.
Commenting on the Diamond Jubilee Honours List in Reynolds’s of 4 July 1897 Gracchus noted that ‘militarism is acclaimed as the chief glory of the Queen’s reign’
The opposition to the Jubilee across the Empire is something that is rather missing from UK focused accounts and that does need to be addressed. At the same time the underlying argument of this paper is that opposition to the monarchy ebbs and flows as does support for Republican alternatives. There is an element of calculation about how far pro-monarchy celebrations can be pushed out and it was clearly judged that an event marking the imperial power of the Empire in 1897 would find a public echo. That it did, but we should not take from that universal support or lack of protest.
SIBA the trade organisation that represents many independent brewers has launched a campaign to promote genuinely independent brewers.
They rightly note, and commissioned a YouGov poll to underline it, that many people who drink what they think is craft beer are in fact drinking beer brewed industrially by outfits such as Camden and Beavertown who are owned by global big beer.
If the campaign gets people who drinking beers like Camden Pale and Beavertown Neck Oil because they want to support indy beers and brewers to look further it will be a good thing.
Of course there is nuance but nuance is not a campaigning issue.
Fullers, owned by Asahi are rightly seen as big beer, although some of the beers they produce such as the annual Vintage Ale are most definitely craft by any addition. Similarly while Greene King Abbot recently won CAMRA’s Champion Beer of Britain, GK are not an indy brewer.
Finally it does need to be noted, ahem, that the brewer probably most associated with craft is Brewdog. Private Equity owns a good chunk but it remains currently independent.
That of course begs further questions still like employment conditions and beer quality..
Still SIBA’s campaign deserves support and the nuances can be argued about in a corner of your favourite bar.
Torres are for today’s east London set what Marlboro Lights were to Soho late nights in the 1990s. (Observer 20th October)
A new book An Ode to Crisps by Natalie Whittle (2024) looks at all things to do with crisps.
It touches on the Spanish crisps from Torres. While it suggests correctly that they are enjoyed in north-east London I first came across them in Cardiff.
The fried egg flavour which tastes exactly as described is perhaps of particular interest. The crisps contain no egg. Whittle asked Torres how the flavour is achieved and they responded by saying its by ‘natural aroma’.
Conker Campaigners slam ‘no cheating’ decision by World Conker Championship organisers.
The Campaign for Real Conkers which supports no rules, anything goes conker playing, has slammed the outcome of an investigation into alleged cheating at last Sunday’s World Conker Championship.
The event is largely a spectator affair with rigid rules governing the conkers used.
One well known participant David Jakins was accused of cheating because he was found with a steel ball painted to look like a conker in his pocket. The accusation has been rightly dismissed. Playing with a steel ball would not be practicable.
However the Campaign has taken exception to a comment by Jakins:
We are gentlemen at the World Conker Championships and we don’t cheat.
The campaigners say it unfortunately suggests an image of the game that it is played by men of a certain age.
CFRC Organiser Keith Flett said, as a game conkers is under threat from screen based alternatives. Rules and regulations put people off playing and surely everyone knows that gentlemen are quite capable of cheating…
Boris Johnson’s memoir officially titled Unleashed was published in hardback on 10th October priced £30 although obviously it can be acquired more cheaply.
10th October is peak pre-Xmas publishing time with 1,090 books published on the day.
Johnson’s is top of the latest best selling hardback (non) fiction list having sold 42,530 copies in the first week. It’s the 12th fastest selling memoir since records began (not that long ago) although as the Sunday Times notes in 11th position is Katie Price’s 2008 volume Jordan: Pushed to the Limit
Johnson’s first week sales beat Dave Cameron’s 2019 For the Record which sold 20,792 and of course Liz Truss who managed 2,228 first week sales.
By contrast Tony Bliar’s A Journey did 92,060 and Thatcher’s 1993 The Downing St Years an estimated 120,000- that was before records started.
It will be interesting to see whether Johnson’s tome captures any of the Xmas market or whether the first week has more or less satisfied what demand there was.
