So, what has happened to us since we started to become ‘Little Britain’?
Well, we now have an exchange rate where you pay a fortune for a single Euro, so holidays in Europe mean taking out a second mortgage when you return.
We have policy being made behind the policy maker’s backs.
We have all of the old public schoolboys making a resurgence and yes you guessed it, we have all forgotten their past misdemeanours and their new rhetoric seems oh so feasible again.
The letter U no longer stands for unity but for U Turn and for the twelfth time in as many years we have decided to change the school exam system to make it easier for the pupils and students to understand ‘big Mac and fries’ by just skipping the words and putting it in pictures instead.
Universities are struggling to survive and huge staff cuts are universal as we are knocked off the top of the world university table.
But wait! There is hope on the horizon, Captain Trump seems to be going to war with Uncle Kim. Lots of sabre rattling and invective but no actual plan or way forward. We don’t know whether we are going to wake up to nuclear war in the morning when we go to bed at night.
So, we play the dance of death where one of the aggressors keeps slipping carefully into the pool and getting out again whilst the other dive bombs in causing the biggest splashes he can. The UN Security Council shouts ‘naughty boy’ to anyone who will listen but fails to wield the cane and bring them to heel. Have we such short memories of the last five major conflicts and their consequences.
It is really unfortunate that we don’t have a vision like Switzerland, their politics, their neutrality and their economy, not to mention the scenery that make it such an inviting prospect.
Or how about Denmark, a high standard of living with high taxes but it is the happiest place in Europe to live and they have sense of freedom like no one else, as well as hygge.
Or Germany, an efficient effective and well-run country. They all have their problems but their key word is vision and truth. So where did we go so wrong?
Perhaps it is because we have lost sight of our own vision. Was it not the vision to have a unified Europe, with one economy, one partnership and one clear pathway to success and freedom? Perhaps I have misinterpreted this simple wish.
It is through our own leaderless and rudderless gross stupidity, our in-fighting, indecision, a reluctance to let the British public know the basic truth and not the politicised fabrications, self-interest and bloody mindedness that we have chosen to be outcasts, run by public school initiatives and managed by people who have never had a meaningful job in their lives?
Our leaders seem hell bent on running around in circles in the schoolyard, wearing short trousers, playing tag and blaming everyone but themselves (you just have to listen to the incessant chatter in the House of Commons to see just how close to animals the cream of this ‘Sceptered Isle’ have become).
It is not the colour of the politics that matters. What we need is a real leader, someone who speaks for the people, understands all classes and for once someone who is not afraid to be honest. Then perhaps we can take stock and recreate a vision to restore respect and faith in our faltering nation.
Answers on a postcard to this address.
*The Normal’s post punk anthem ‘She’s Shitting on Britain’
Professor Chris Kemp is CEO of Mind over Matter Consultancy and works with world leaders in their fields running Extreme Corporate Away Days for leaders and managers, as well as Executive Education and Team Development programmes.
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