From Tuscany to Tyrone

The increasingly bizarre antics of a government that is spinning out of control are hard to keep up with, except for one constant; it is always someone else’s fault.

Jacob Rees-Mogg apparently believes that civil service staff are working from their second homes in Tuscany.

The minister for Brexit opportunities obviously has a strange idea of how much his staff are paid. But far more worrying than his disconnect from the real world is what this means for the civil service.

They are coming for the civil servants next. They are the next scapegoat, their jobs are at risk, their pay will be lied about and used to whip up hate about why they are comfortable when many can’t feed their children. And their pensions?

Well, all I can say to any civil servant reading this is—-ram it with every spare penny you have now, it won’t be here much longer.

The damage that all this will do to recruitment, retention and the capacity of the civil service is of no concern to this government.

There is a new group to blame. The press will run articles about Sir Humphrey’s pay, top civil servants house prices will be splashed on the front page, their pension pots will be wildly over-estimated and the cars in their drives valued.

The same is happening in Northern Ireland where the PM claims he cannot fight the cost of living crisis because Brussels is forcing him to spend so much time sorting out the mess that is the NIP. The mess he made, negotiated, signed, pushed through parliament and won an 80 seat majority with and lied about again and again, that mess.

A mess which the majority of people in Northern Ireland wish him to leave well alone.

But no the PM must let children starve and pensioners freeze so he can dash to Belfast to make political capital out of his own incompetence.

Whether hungry parents will fall for these utterly cynical lies is not the point, some of the core support will hate and blame someone else. That is enough.

Meanwhile ministers come on TV and tell the poor to work harder or get a better job.

This is not so much uncaring as deliberately antagonistic.

This is like taunting the homeless by burning £50 notes in front of them.

Also, don’t forget that such governments never run out of targets. Already the government is slavering over the prospects of strikes this summer, the perfect chance to go for the unions. Having lost most of local government to opposition parties it will be an easy target to blame. Brussels is always available, as are asylum seekers and perhaps profiteering food companies and supermarkets.

The list is endless, the buck can never stop anywhere near the PM is the only rule of government now.

Jonty’s Jottings

Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.

By Jonty Bloom

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