What a time to be alive. Yesterday, we heard the news that British Steel had gone bust, with the loss of 5000 good jobs, with the consequential loss of some 20,000 jobs in the supply chain. That’s 25,000 potential tragedies, probably many more. Just like every other town and city across the land, there are plenty of jobs but what soon be former steelworkers will soon discover is Britain’s addiction to low paid work. That could be an even bigger shock than losing one’s job. Then, I look at today’s newspapers and not a single one leads with this story.
Most papers lead with speculation, well-founded, to be sure, that Theresa May will soon be an ex prime minister. Indeed, the Sun and the Mirror point out that yesterday May left Downing Street in tears. The Sun even made a ‘joke’ about it. Only the Daily Star ran with something different: Michael Barrymore bemoaning the death of his career.
Whatever May’s distress, they will be but nothing compared to how the people of Scunthorpe will feel. For one thing, her husband Philip May is rich beyond avarice. She will live in total luxury for the rest of her life regardless of what happens to the country she misled, lied to and ultimately sets to leave in a terrible mess. If her tears are to mean anything, they should be of contrition, in recognition of the broken country she has done so much to break.
May’s tears are genuine, that’s for sure, whether they are genuine sadness or self-pity. Frankly, mam, I don’t give a damn. Because you are directly responsible for the coming closure of Scunthorpe’s main employer.
May’s pathetic lies and empty rhetoric over Brexit, in combination with her bungling incompetence, have caused a wasteland of hopes and dreams, not to mention the wasteland of bulldozed factories that will soon join them. Leaving the EU is the reason why British Steel going bust, just like Brexit is directly responsible for the closure of Honda in Swindon and the end of further investment in Nissan in Sunderland. Let’s cut out the crap and acknowledge the truth. And this is just the start.
The London centric media doesn’t care about Scunthorpe. Today, for example, the media is fixated with HS2, the £56 billion rail project – it’s the subject of Radio Five Live’s phone-on, for God’s sake – whilst everywhere else commuters stand in crowded, geriatric trains with abysmal punctuality and customer satisfaction records. And they pay through the nose for it.
In fact, the loss of 25,000 jobs didn’t even make the BBC news this morning, whilst the deduction of a few extra points to the UK’s Eurovision entry did. Human tragedy, it seems, doesn’t matter anymore.
Apparently, all we care about is the plight of the most incompetent prime minister of our lifetimes, a third-rate Basil Fawlty impersonator and a light-hearted song contest. Perhaps we deserve the state we are in.
