In an utterly gaslighting speech today from the Rishi Sunak the British Prime Minister, we saw brought to the fore many of the issues prevalent in modern politics: lies, false equivalencies, and self-contradictory phrases and mantras which one can only assume are intended to bamboozle the electorate.  The message in essence as far as I could tell was that Britain is so good at reducing its emissions, so much better than everyone else, that in fact we should slow down – presumably the other countries are embarrassed and we feel bad for them.

Forget for the moment that the British Prime Minister decided not to attend the special UN Climate Summit this month – which some speculate is because the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said that only countries with ‘ambitious targets’ for Net Zero would be allowed to speak… the very concept of being a ‘World Leading’ influence and then slowing down is quite simply laughable.  (Have you ever seen a marathon runner slowing down so that his opponents could catch-up?)

Yet despite the context of the speech, this isn’t about Climate Change, this article is about politics and how we can live in a society where politicians of all colours (but in this example, the government of the day), can stand up in public and make demonstrably erroneous or ridiculous statements and still expect to be taken seriously.  Here are just some of the things that the British Prime Minister said:

“I’m introducing a new exemption today so that they [households for whom this will be the hardest] will never have to switch [to heat pumps] at all.  Now this doesn’t mean I am any less committed to decarbonising our homes…

“I think people are tired of the false choice, between two versions of change that never go beyond the slogan.”

“Too often, motivated by short-term thinking, politicians have taken the easy way out, telling people the bits they want to hear, and not necessarily the bits they need to hear.”

“Can we be honest when the facts change, even when it is awkward?” he asked, after having talked about his 5 priorities, and when it came to the fourth of these “NHS Waiting lists will fall and people will get the care they need more quickly” he changed that priority to “The NHS, treating more patients than last year.”

Asking if the country should carry on as it is, or change, he answered with “I’ve made my decision, we are going to change.”  Closely followed by his complaint that decisions are being made “…without any meaningful democratic debate…”

He supported a statement by the Climate Change Committee saying that “You don’t reach Net Zero simply by wishing it.” before announcing the end of or extension to delays for policies that are aimed at helping to bring Net Zero about…

He stipulated that his government would “…end the ‘first-come first-served’ approach to grid connection… by making sure that those ready first, will connect first”.

The whole of the political environment is utterly, utterly broken.  Politicians (in the UK at least) are only held to account by themselves… they make the rules, they break the rules, and only they have to power to sanction themselves for breaking the rules… which let’s face it, they rarely do.

These examples are stark, and yet echo the idiotic performance of the Home Secretary Suella Braverman that very morning.  In several interviews she states:

“I disagree with Lord Goldsmith on this, he is an expert in this field but I disagree with him.”

Having stated that the Net Zero targets were arbitrary, she was asked by the interviewer to confirm that she thought these targets (set by Boris Johnson) were arbitrary she said “No, I think we need to check that these targets are achievable.”

“I am not going to pre-judge what the Prime Minister is going to set out in detail, but I would say, I do commend him for taking difficult decisions, long-term decision…”

Hard to see how anyone can stand behind something that has not yet been said… unless of course she’s either a) lying, or b) blindly following a person regardless of what they say.  Perhaps it is both…

As I said at the start, this article is not about Climate Change, rather about the (what appears to me to be) societal acceptance surrounding politics: an established norm of behaviour, which effectively allows politicians to say whatever bollocks comes into their heads, without any fear that their contradictions, lies and obfuscations will ever be pointed out – let alone that they should be held to account for them.  (This isn’t even considering that UK political protocol is that policies should be announce in parliament before being announced in public, and that this speech was a blatant disregard for that particular rule… AGAIN!)

There is NO policing of our political representatives, there is NO ability to hold them to account, there is NO way of even ensuring that they follow the rules that THEY THEMSELVES set – without of course, their consent.

Well I do not consent.

I do not consent to being lied to, I do not consent to having no empirical measure of their performance.  I do not consent to ministers not turning up to parliament to answer questions, I do not consent to politicians breaking their own rules, I do not consent to politicians policing themselves…

…and yet I have no power to stop it…