“… there has been one question going round and round in my head since the election was called yesterday afternoon. Where is politics? What is politics? Who is it for?... Politics isn’t Westminster … Politics is the thing that dictates the kind of society we live in; whether it’s one where most people are alright, or where most people aren’t.”
As soon as General Election rumours started swirling yesterday, my eyes and those of many others were watching Twitter closely. Not the BBC website, or the House of Commons where we could listen to Rishi Sunak’s answers in Prime Minister’s Questions, but Twitter. As journalists received tip-offs about politicians cancelling engagements and what was going on inside Number 10, they tweeted what they were hearing in real-time, and the tweets escalated in frequency and in urgency as the hours passed. Eventually, there was a flurry of declarations within a matter of minutes from the most high-profile political journalists in the UK, telling us that an election had been called, and that it would happen on 4th July.
Almost immediately, media outlets began publishing frantically written articles, sharing “breaking news” banners, and publicising these widely across their social media networks. But the news had already broken, and was spreading fast.
It was interesting to see things crank into gear in real-time. Keir Starmer’s twitter account shared a pre-prepared campaign video, full of powerful imagery, careful rhetoric, a typo (which seems weird), and an overarching message of change. More tweets came too, and most contained similar messages; the word “change” was everywhere - written on placards, and lecterns, and repeated emphatically.
Sunak, meanwhile, launched into speeches where he pitched himself as the underdog. He was seemingly unaware of the blinding insensitivity of this, given that his political party has been in power for 14 years, and have been the architects of their own demise. We have all suffered at their hands, the entire nation, that is, apart from Sunak presumably, who has been cushioned from the suffering because of the immense luxury his wealth allows him to inhabit.
It was a bizarre day from start to finish. Sunak told very few others about his plan for a July election ahead of the announcement, leaving some Tory MPs very unhappy. He didn’t even have a member of staff on-hand with an umbrella at the announcement itself, which seems out-of-character for a man who thinks hard about his personal image at all times. Instead, he stood outside Number 10 Downing Street becoming steadily soaked through, drowned out not only by the rain but also by the blaring of “Things Can Only Get Better” from protestor Steve Bray’s speakers nearby. Things couldn’t have gone much worse for Sunak’s election announcement, and it didn’t stop there. He followed it up with a rally in the Excel centre in East London. It seems horribly ambitious for such an unpopular Prime Minister to book the Excel, given its size, but no matter. What the Conservative Party lacked in numbers, they made up for by pushing everyone together to create the illusion of a crowd. From the coverage I’ve seen, it looks like the tiny number of attendees were squashed together like a family having a photo taken on an iphone at a barbecue and had expressions to match. “Smile”, the photographer seemed to have said to all of the attending Conservative MPs. Some seemed to manage this more successfully than others, with David Cameron looking decidedly uncomfortable as the minutes wore on.
I was watching the rally on Sky, and the journalist who had turned up to cover the event was forcefully removed from the venue, which resulted in a bizarre interview where he answered questions while walking along the exterior of the Excel centre, closely followed by a security guard who remained in shot throughout. The scenario was strangely fitting; instead of carefully curated footage, we saw a bleak, concrete backdrop. The backdrop of a country that has been broken by the people inside the conference centre.
I can’t imagine that Rishi Sunak’s election announcement went the way he had hoped. It seems bizarre really, because as sitting Prime Minister he had control over when the election was announced, and how it was announced. He’s not very good at running the country, but his team of PR experts are normally pretty good at stage-managing things. It all felt a bit amiss.
As soon as the announcement came, the media machinery got going in earnest, and so I thought I’d pay attention and find out what they were saying. But honestly? This has felt even more jarring than anything Rishi Sunak has said in the past 24 hours.
It’s well-known that there’s a “Westminster bubble”; the group of journalists and associates who spend their time walking the corridors and streets of Westminster around parliament, andcommenting on what is going on. It’s a cottage industry; spawning podcasts and publications, and feeding a conveyor belt of articles for major news publications. The politicians are treated like celebrities by those in the Westminster bubble, and the smallest pieces of information are considered newsworthy. Rumours spread, gossip is shared, and it’s immensely powerful because all of this creates clickable content which in turn generates ad revenue. That’s why many of us are peeled to Twitter during important national events; these journalists often know what’s going on before anyone else. They’ll have the juice, and they’re desperate to tell us first. But when you actually listen to what they’re saying during a national crisis, or a scandal, or when a major political event is taking place, their interpretation of what’s going on often feels misplaced, and yesterday was no different.
I’ve listened to about 5 podcasts put together by national news outlets and major political journalists in the past 24 hours, and the first observation I have is that the content is broadly similar. You might expect that journalists from different publications had a different version of events, or different predictions, but strangely they all seem to have similar ideas about what’s going on, and similar predictions - it’s as if the Westminster bubble has its own party line. The political pundits share something else in common too; they don’t seem very aware of those outside the bubble, and how their opinions might be viewed by those who are living in other parts of the UK, or truly struggling with circumstances caused by the politicians they chronicle. In a way, it all feels like it’s a big game to the journalists, a laugh, and you can imagine that after they’ve finished the podcast they just go to the pub and forget all about it.
Here are some things that I have heard about from prominent political journalists in the past 24 hours:
They seem keen to focus on the Conservative Party and the Labour Party, and the other parties or independent candidates barely get a look in, in terms of the reporting and speculation about election success. This seems weird, given the results of the local elections, and the widespread dissatisfaction with the policy proposals coming from both major parties, but is probably an intentional move, instructed by the editorial line of media publications.
There is a huge amount of coverage about the “optics” and the political success of politicians’ behaviour, and less focus on the actual impact of any of this on peoples’ lives. One journalist explained in detail that they thought Keir Starmer’s campaign was leading with a message of “change” because of a poll that has recently come out from Ipsos Mori which showed: “73% think it is time for change at the next General Election”. Perhaps that is true, but if so, that is extraordinarily depressing to contemplate.
Several journalists mentioned that Rishi Sunak may have decided to hold an election now because it would allow him to move his family to California and enrol his children in school in time for the autumn term. Again, feasible, but incredibly depressing. In fact, schools came up a lot. One journalist suggested that perhaps the 4th July date was a bad idea for the Conservatives because of the Summer holiday dates of private schools? It just seemed a little bit … out of touch.
Speaking of “out-of-touch”, I heard not 1, not 2, not 3 but 4 political journalists talk in worried tones about how journalists and politicians were feeling miffed about the date of the election because they would need to cancel holidays that they had booked, and that this was terribly inconvenient.
I can’t help feeling frustrated by all of this, and there has been one question going round and round in my head since the election was called yesterday afternoon. Where is politics? What is politics? Who is it for? Because it’s not this. It’s not the Westminster bubble. It’s not shiny conference rooms or the bleak walkways outside. It’s not helicopters or shiny lecterns or the rueful chuckles of the enormously successful political journalists who actually benefit from the scandals and the turmoil of it all.
Politics isn’t Westminster. Politics isn’t clever people who have gone to university and are pals with one another, and have quiet drinks exchanging stories in hallowed halls. Politics isn’t picking a date so that you can avoid your planned holiday, or picking a date so you can leave the country and the mess you’ve made, or picking a date because you’ve broken everything and it’s all getting worse, and the house of cards you’ve built so intricately is starting to come crashing down. Or maybe it is. That’s one version of it, the version we hear when we turn on the TV or open a newspaper. But that’s not why politics matters. That’s not why it’s important. It’s not why most of us are watching to see when this election date is happening, and watching to see what’s being said.
Politics is knowing that the ambulance will get to your Mum in time when she’s really sick. Politics is having enough money in your wallet so that you can pay for your kids’ food and turn the heating on in winter. Forget holidays; we’re living through a cost-of-living crisis and many people have far bigger concerns than cancelling their holidays right now.
Politics is the thing that dictates the kind of society we live in; whether it’s one where most people are alright, or where most people aren’t. Politics matters because it affects every single one of us, and that is why this election matters, and that is why we must fight for it to improve. And that energy, those feelings, that enormous desire for change aren’t being captured by these political pundits in the Westminster bubble. In fact, I don’t think they have their finger on the pulse at all.
I think that for decades now, the political parties, and our (mostly privately-owned) media bubble has pushed rhetoric onto the public, just as the politicians do, and they have gotten away with it because there wasn’t a better alternative. They’re not going to stop doing that, in fact the Conservatives have raised the amount that political parties could spend during election campaigns just months ago, to an astronomical level, and they’ll be using that money to reach as many eyeballs and ears as they can:
(From Sky News, November 2023):
“The new rules were pushed through via a statutory instrument on Monday and mean the national election spending cap on political parties will rise by 80%, to about £35m.”
It also looks like the Conservatives are already engaging in dirty tactics with theirelectioneering. Adam Bienkov, who writes a brilliant Substack newsletter, tweeted earlier:
“So Rishi Sunak just took a question from a hi-vis jacket-wearing man at a campaign event in a McVities warehouse. It turns out the man is actually local Conservative councillor Ross Hills. Hills just admitted to me to being asked to appear at the event”
But peoples’ trust in politicians and the traditional sources of media is plummeting now. Ipsos published this information in December last year:
“Just nine per cent of the British public say they trust politicians to tell the truth, down from twelve per cent in 2022. This makes them the least trusted profession in Britain. Although trust in politicians is usually low, this years’ score is the lowest for politicians since the first wave of the survey in 1983; aside from 2022 the previous low was a score of 13%, which occurred in 2009 following the expenses scandal…The five least trusted professions are politicians, government ministers, advertising executives, journalists and estate agents. Politicians, ministers and journalists have seen a decrease in their level of public trust since 2022”
This General Election matters, and there is a huge amount of energy for real change, but there’s also an enormous disconnect between the extremely wealthy, the donors, the privately owned media outlets, the Westminster bubble, and everyone else. There will be enormous efforts made to tell the public that this is a two-horse race; it’s the Tories or Labour. I don’t think that’s accurate, and I think a lot of people realise that too; many people aren’t wildly enthusiastic about Starmer, they don’t like his policies very much, and they’re seeking an alternative.
That’s the real story of this election, and I’m not sure it’s one we’ll find from those within the Westminster bubble. I think people will find that information on social media, or in newsletters like this one. That’s interesting, and hopeful. Despite the best efforts of powerful people and the Westminster bubble, I don’t think they’re going to be able to stifle the desire for change, democracy, and new, transformative ideas in UK politics. I think the next few weeks are going to be very interesting indeed.
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We can only hope the electorate will send many thoughtful, progressive people to Parliament who are not members of the Conservative Party or the Labour Party. It would provide even more hope if all progressive Labour candidates who remain are elected and the most right-wing elements (including Starmer, Reeves, and Streeting) are defeated.
I would also hope that journalists will take note that they, of all people, are amongst the five professions least trusted by the public. That is astonishing.
It's interesting that the scapegoated health and medical staff, who are woefully underfunded are not on the distrusted list.