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It doesn’t do to dwell in the past. Generally comparisons are unreal and unfair. Societies were different, beliefs were different, fears were different. So comparing my life as a young man in the 1970s to the life of someone in their 20s today is a pointless exercise. But history gives us one important lesson. Times change. They definitely changed when the great plague wiped out a third of the population. They changed when whole streets of young men and husbands were wiped out in the first World war. They changed when the male workforce went off to the second World war and women proved they could do the job and began a slow march to equality. They changed when our coal, steel and other manufacturing industries were wiped out by the lack of raw materials, technological advances and internal market forces. I don’t recall any furlough scheme for the miners and steel workers. We invested half heartedly in their retraining, but there was no outcry when many spent the rest of their lives unemployed. We find ourselves in a new situation where hospitality jobs are under threat, which is odd because pubs have been closing at a stupid rate over the years and we haven’t batted an eyelid. The equivalent of those lost jobs probably exist in the coffee shops of today. There is a change that is often overlooked. In my home town there were four places where you went for coffee in the 70s, today there are over 20. Where there was one nightclub there are now a dozen. Where we would go out once a week, it seems essential to go out several times a week and probably drink more than we did. This is not criticism, this is observation. And I observe that, if we add multi car families, multi tv houses, gardens with bbqs, mobile phones, satellite TV, wardrobes full of shoes and casual clothes, weddings that costs thousands of pounds, obligatory foreign holidays… that we are generally a more affluent society with greater disposable income, more money to spend. So, while I have sympathy for and feel we should support those people who are in danger of losing their jobs, we should remember that times change,  situations are transitory, economies recover, jobs are created. No one suggested we should all burn more coal or put steel railings around our houses, that we shouldn’t defend our country, which is why we need to bite the bullet and concede that, currently, these jobs do not exist and propping them up is no guarantee they will ever exist in the same way. Times change.

It’s probably of little interest to non-football followers, but Tottenham Hotspur were denied a victory because of a handball decision. It was so outrageous that even the manager of the opposition criticised it and the whole football punditry world joined in. It was not the first time this season that the new handball laws have been questioned. In an effort to clarify things, the lawmakers have added confusion and nonsense to a law that has worked pretty well for decades. Though their intentions were probable laudable, the tinkering of the powers that be has proved to be a disaster. And that tinkering is the point. Back in the day when you could open the bonnet of a car and recognise the components contained therein, when you didn’t need a diagnostic computer to tell you that a bulb had blown and four hours of labour to fix it. Back in the day, men would often spend an hour or two on a weekend tinkering with their cars. The outcome of their efforts was not great. The car would still start and function as it was required to do. Tinkering has no effect but to give satisfaction to those who tinker. But at some point tinkering becomes meddling and it is inevitable that meddling leads to disaster because meddlers usually have no idea about what they are meddling with. So the man that sprayed his carburettor with a bit of WD40 and rubbed off some of the grime and grease was a harmless tinker. The man that dismantled his carburettor and had no idea about how to readjust it was a meddler. It’s the same in football. If some lawmaker had sat in a room of managers and senior professionals they would have given him the benefit of their accumulated experience and we may have laws that work and don’t leave the football lovers in uproar. I’m sure you know where this is going. We elect 650 people to represent our views and aspirations, yet maybe four people at the top of the heap (not all of them elected) have been meddling, unchecked and unaccountable, in the health system, the education system, the local government system, the legal system… using ‘the science’ as a convenient scapegoat. The excuse that they needed to react quickly is lamentable. If I am driving down the road and can see that the vehicle four cars in front of me is using his brakes, I don’t wait to brake until I am about to hit the car in front of me. When every country in Europe was suffering, how could we expect not to? Having gained ‘peace in our time’ we ignored Hitler’s various annexations until it was too late. However, we made time to debate starting World War One and other conflicts. If we don’t waste time, look at what is going on around us, use the combined talents of the people we elect and employ, then maybe we will be less dependent on the headless chickens currently flitting from one disaster to the next.

When I was a youth, generally you respected your elders. They had more experience of life and the workplace than you. You felt that you could trust them. Of course, there was only a newspaper to read and one news bulletin that lasted ten minutes in those days because there were only two tv channels and there were better things to watch, so we thought, than the boring news. Now we have 24 hour news, somebody sneezes in Little Snoring and someone will record it with a tweet or facebook post and, if it’s a really big sneeze, it will make it on to the BBC website and maybe the tv news. The upshot is that no one can get away with anything now. Our ‘elders’ probably had flaws but we didn’t know about them so our respect was never seriously threatened. Conversely, now when you choose to put yourself in a position of responsibility, every action is subject to examination and it becomes increasingly difficult to tell one group of society to follow one set of rules while you flagrantly break the rules yourself. Currently, the younger members of our society are being blamed, probably correctly, for not strictly following Covid rules. I understand their frustration. While they protest about the environment, A-levels or black lives, from the 60s we have been on the warpath over Vietnam, women’s rights, gay rights, Northern Ireland, nuclear disarmament, the Iraq war to name but a few. And we partied – anyone that denies it must have been asleep for 20 years or more. The problem is that if you want to win and maintain respect you have to set an example and follow the rules. You win no respect if you say to someone ‘you can’t do this, but I can’. It was bad enough when our supposed opinion leaders and policy makers flouted their own policies in self-interest. An excellent opportunity for the rest of us to ignore the rules when they become inconvenient. But they were rules sent down from on high and, to a certain extent, we have a right to challenge them. It’s a different matter when you have signed an agreement. The important bit here is agreement. No one forced you to sign it, bullied, cajoled or blackmailed. You sat in a room, had a discussion, agreed on something, had it written down and added your name to it. It is binding, it is a contract. Trying to re-write the Withdrawal Agreement is tantamount to you telling your building society that, although you have signed an agreement with them, you aren’t going to make any more payments. Or exchanging contracts to sell your house, but refusing to move out. Agreements are fundamental to the way the world operates. On a smaller scale and currently pertinent, for every purchase you make on ebay you leave feedback. Suppliers are desperate to get as close to 100% as they can because if their rating drops by even a few points, they know you and countless others will be using the more dependable, trustworthy supplier with a better record. Trump-like, our nation’s leadership has decided that an international agreement we entered into doesn’t suit us any more. How many countries will now enter an agreement with us if they know we will tear it up at any time we feel it is no longer in our interest? And that brings us back to respect. Some things don’t change, you earn respect and with respect goes trust. Who can we trust anymore?

It’s a tough ask, trying to dodge being put into a category, avoiding a label. Everything has a label nowadays we are all classified in every possible way. There was a time when age and gender were enough, unless you were a boy at school and then your ‘team’ counted. In my youth you always supported your local team, so it was never really an issue, but in this age of adopt-a-team even if they are in a different country, things aren’t so simple. In school we had a few kids who were a bit ‘slow’ and those that ‘messed’ around, that was as far as the label went. They were fine, they were our friends and generally got hauled along in terms of performance and behaviour. Now they will be labelled and assigned to one ‘spectrum’ or another, which turns out to be a life sentence because these labels stick. And that is a concern because I really don’t know if I am left or right. Admittedly, most of us start off as teenagers with slightly socialist views, but by the time we reach our senior years our views have hardened and become more self-interested which pushes us towards the right. I find myself in a quandary. For example, I would like to see university education provided for free, as it used to be. And not just university, I believe it would be beneficial if the same funds were allocated to apprenticeships. Students will still pay for their accommodation. I am not advocating an increase in university numbers. My left wing leaning swings rapidly to the right and I wouldn’t object to university places being reduced. To pay for this and proper funding for schools, hospitals, care homes, etc., I would not object to an increase in income tax. We whinge and moan about how all the services are suffering, but we brought it on ourselves. When successive governments promised us the earth we believed them. Of course we have paid for it. We no longer own our water services, our waste services, many of our electricity suppliers, some train lines…. Nor must we forget that our basic rate of income tax is now 20% where is was 30% or over until 1986. I am not an economist, but if my income was reduced by a third would I expect my standard of living to be the same? Of course not. So how do we expect as government to supply the same services when we have effectively reduced income tax by 33%. And don’t believe the VAT argument. It may be 17.5%, but the Purchase Tax it replaced was 25%. Enough of my pandering to the masses on the left. My right wing side can be pretty devilish too. No one has suggested it yet, but I believe we could save a fortune on the prison service with a bit of dye. You get convicted of rape, you don’t go to prison, your face is dyed some hideous yellow. Now go out in society and be stigmatised daily for what you have done rather than sit in a prison watching tv and getting a subsidised degree. Pick the colours you feel most appropriate and ensure that the felons are confronted by the public for their crimes. Would it make people think twice about committing a crime? I suspect so. It would add a new meaning to the saying ‘unable to show his face’. It is a question of balance. We have a long and noble history of accepting people seeking asylum from oppressive, evil regimes. The protestant Huguenots arrived from France in the 16th century, We willingly accepted tens of thousands of Jews from Europe in the 1930s and 40s. Children were admitted from Spain as the fascists bombed the Basque country during the civil war.  In 1956 we took in Hungarians fleeing from Soviet rule. In 1972 Idi Amin gave Asians 90 days to leave Uganda. We took in Vietnamese boat people and Kosovar refugees. They have all been absorbed into our society and made their contributions to that society, culturally and financially. It was never in our nature to turn our backs on people in need, whether they were neighbours from two doors away or those at risk a continent away. Illegal immigrants are a separate question. There are legitimate routes into the country and these should be maintained. To cosy up to us, and keep themselves in power, the political parties seem to have little interest in doing what is best for the country. They want the easy middle ground where you don’t have to have strong principles or beliefs, you just need to con the voters into believing you are giving them what they want. It doesn’t matter if you are left or right, your views are going to be ignored.

Governments get criticised for U turns, which is not always fair. Sometimes things change so quickly in this world that you may be obliged to change policies on the fly. What is not acceptable is a lack of planning. When we decide to replace our kitchen, we think about it well in advance. We probably have an idea when we want the work done and gear our efforts so that everything is in place for the big day. We went into lock down in March. We knew that A-level results would be out in August. That leaves four months to plan. It’s four months to construct an algorithm that, at least, mimics the final results of last year. It’s four months in which to run last year’s data through it and see if it comes up with the same results. There will inevitably be some winners and losers, but they can appeal. There should not be 40% of A-level candidates on the losing side. We went into lock down in March. It seemed inevitable that schools would not be back fully functioning until September. Another four months to formulate a plan. Let’s call it plan A. And then let’s formulate a series of other plans to accommodate the changing circumstances. Oh and let’s get the teachers and the schools involved because, at the end of the day, they have to put it into action, not the Prime Minister holidaying in Scotland or the Education Minister off with his relatives. If they’d done a bit of preparation, they could have gone off on their holidays with a clear conscience knowing that everything was in place, all those involved were at the same place on the same page. When you had that new kitchen installed, a week before the fitters came did you change your mind on the positioning of the sink and the style of units you wanted? I thought not.