SALLUST

The Telegraph has a column by Simon Heffer, currently in Australia, about how from an Australia perspective it’s clear Britain is in worse shape than we think. Australia, with so many people who are British or of British origin, is uniquely placed to look on with dismay as the seemingly endless spiral of self-inflicted decay motors on, accelerated by the current government. It makes for a sobering read:

It is clear from their view of our country, despite the affection almost all feel for it, that we now cut a poor figure in the world. Many Britons know this too: but living there we have, perhaps, become inured to all that is going wrong, and to the chronic incompetence and poor judgement that are diminishing us in the eyes of our international peers. Having spent a month looking at Britain from 11,000 miles away, I have become acutely aware not just of how bad things are, but how utterly unacceptable this mess is.

Our Australian cousins who watch our political life see a Britain with a feeble and uncharismatic Prime Minister whose judgement about people and policies is appalling, and whose life is distinguished by a parade of hypocrisy. They all know about his £20,000 spectacles bill picked up by Lord Alli, his free tickets to Arsenal and the provision of free clothes for his wife. They see him as hapless and leading a divided government. They see, too, an administration staffed by ministers with an uncertain relationship with the truth.

There is a Chancellor of the Exchequer who lied about her career, used to make questionable expenses claims and has, incidentally, torpedoed the economy through her ineptitude, potentially putting thousands out of work, threatening agriculture and driving wealth creators abroad. There is also a Business Secretary who has repeatedly claimed to be a solicitor but isn’t; and even the hitherto untouchable Angela Rayner is now accused of fabricating parts of her own CV.

Australia has made huge efforts to control immigration. Its people note that we have a Home Secretary who pledged to “stop the boats” but hasn’t, and who also presides over a crime wave of stabbings, shoplifters, phone-snatchers and Rolex rippers. Britain is renowned for not knowing how many inhabitants it has. Last week’s eruptions by Donald Trump have reminded the world of how little influence America’s supposedly key ally now has in vital international affairs, and that it has a Foreign Secretary who in 2018 called Mr Trump (among other things) a neo-Nazi. The UK welfare bill is much remarked upon, while our failure to spend more defending ourselves appears to come as a direct consequence of that profligacy.

The NHS is no longer the envy of the world: the Health Secretary adds tens of thousands of people to the NHS payroll while delivering a worse service. The Education Secretary seems driven by class hatred, and is overloading the state schools system following her vendetta against private schools. The Energy Secretary is denying poor people cheaper fuel by insisting on renewables they can’t afford, constructing a fantasy of an electrically-powered Britain that can’t generate enough electricity (that is familiar to Australians, for the same is happening here).

That last comment is a reminder that not everything is perfect about Australia, but it has a long way to go before reaching where Britain has taken itself.

Heffer asked a Labour MP last summer what would happen after the inevitable Labour election victory:

“Five years of managed decline,” he answered. He said they had no money for anything else. But it is increasingly obvious to the world, as it must be to us, that this isn’t managed decline; it’s unmanaged decline. Our appearance as a failing, flailing, once-great nation is the fruit of stupidity, incompetence, ideological prejudice and atrocious judgement.

Heffer finishes up by noting “the serial derelictions that have reduced us to an object of pity among our friends around the world”.

Worth reading in full.

This article (The Australian Perspective: Britain Is in Worse Shape Than You Thought) was created and published by Daily Sceptic and is republished here under “Fair Use” with attribution to the author Sallust