Honesty, candour, truthfullmess, integrity and humility in politics and politicians are central to the proper functioning of a democracy
Trust is the essence of life and leadership to build a better world for all
...and when that trust is broken, Life loses its meaning and purpose
The Loss of Humanity is the Biggest Casualty of Being Dishonest
Will the Nasty Party Ever Learn How To Be Human?
Nicola Jennings on the government's NHS pay offer – cartoon, The Guardian 7 March 2021
The Assault on Truth by Peter Oborne
Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and the Emergence of a New Moral Barbarism
…’In The Assault on Truth, a short and powerful new polemic, Oborne shows how Boris Johnson lied again and again in order to secure victory so he could force through Brexit in the face of parliamentary opposition. Johnson and his ministers then lied repeatedly to win the general election in December 2019. The government’s woeful response to the coronavirus pandemic has generated another wave of falsehoods, misrepresentations and fabrications…’- The Assault on Truth
The Assault on Truth by Peter Oborne review – Boris Johnson's lies- by William Davies
The record-beating cost to the taxpayer of Boris Johnson’s wasteful government
‘Now we health workers know how empty Boris Johnson's 'clap for heroes' really was.’-Rachel Clarke,
palliative care doctor and author of Breathtaking: Inside the NHS in a Time of Pandemic
“There’s a lot we need to do in this party of ours. Our base is too narrow and so, occasionally, are our sympathies. You know what some people call us—
the nasty party... No more glib moralizing, no more hypocritical finger-wagging...”- Theresa May, October 2002, Bournemouth International Centre
'A protest outside Downing Street on 7 March over the government’s NHS pay proposal.'-
Photo: Guy Smallman/Getty Images, Via The Guardian
As it happens, nearly 19 years on, a series of nasty actions and policies have confirmed that the nasty party
has never gone away, so very sadly for the many but not the few!!
The Nasty Party, the Party of Dark Money, Dirty Politics, Outsourcing, Job for the Boys,
Greed is Good and Poshness is Best vs Humanity
Photo: NASTY PARTY: Tory MPs Vote AGAINST Feeding UK’s Poorest Children As Boris Levels Down UK
'This is not about politics, it's about humanity'
Voting against free school meals shames our country and belittles our nation
The Nasty Party has Reconfirmed that Leopards Cannot Change their Spots
Yes, it is true! Photo: Twitter
Our Heros, the Nasty Party and What it Means to be Human
During the first lockdown, the government encouraged people to pay
tribute to healthcare workers by clapping. Photo: BBC
Thank You NHS for who you are and what you do. The nation owes you a debt of gratitude.
Britain’s greatest achievement: The NHS, Happy Birthday, We Love You
The NHS: The Healthcare for the Common Good
God Bless the NHS: Roger Taylor
The Spirit of '45: When Britons Chose the Common Good
Thanks, Danny Boyle, for Celebrating the Common Good
Britain’s greatest achievement: Wishing Our Precious NHS a Very Happy 70th Birthday
In Memoriam: Healthcare Workers Who Have Died of COVID-19
Tribute to the health workers named so far (as of 28 May 2020)
They gave their lives so that we may live ours- lest we forget.
Photo:PA Wire
And Lest We Forget: He Fooled the Nation Again!
‘Our NHS is the beating heart of this country. It is the best of this country.
It is unconquerable. It is powered by love.’
On April 2, 2020 Boris Johnson claps outside 11 Downing Street to salute heroes during Thursday's nationwide Clap
for Carers NHS initiative to applaud workers fighting the coronavirus pandemic. -Photo: AP
‘Now we health workers know how empty Boris Johnson's 'clap for heroes' really was.’-Rachel Clarke,
palliative care doctor and author of Breathtaking: Inside the NHS in a Time of Pandemic
‘We’ve had a traumatic year and lost patients and colleagues. But all he offers us is a derisory 1% pay offer.’
‘When the NHS saved his life last April, Boris Johnson could not have reacted more fulsomely on social media. “Our NHS is the beating heart of this country,” he waxed lyrical in a widely posted video. “It is the best of this country. It is unconquerable. It is powered by love.” The prime minister made a point of singling out two of his intensive care nurses by name, Luis Pitarma and Jenny McGee, whose courage, devotion and duty left him struggling “to find words to express my debt”.
Those of us risking our lives at the time – making the daily choice to brave hospital wards, general practices and care homes steeped in Covid – watched askance as the media lapped it up. We remembered all too well the footage in 2017 of Conservative MPs in the House of Commons literally cheering as they voted down a proper pay rise for nurses. Boris Johnson was, of course, among them, as were Rishi Sunak, Matt Hancock and the rest of the current cabinet…’-Continue to read this excellent article
‘NHS pay offer: looks like contempt for Covid heroes.’- Editorial, the Guardian, Friday 5 March 2021
‘The government does not think key workers, without whom society would have ground to a halt during the pandemic, are worth rewarding.’
‘After the first world war, it was said of the soldiers that they were “lions led by donkeys”, with the donkeys being the uncaring, inept generals responsible for thousands of frontline deaths through callousness. NHS staff lost hundreds of colleagues fighting the virus, often without adequate protective equipment. Ministers who think they only deserve a stingy 1% cash pay rise in England risk being branded Covid donkeys. After a summer when the country clapped for NHS workers, ministers today seem contemptuous of yesterday’s heroes…’- Continue to read this excellent Editorial
Boris Johnson with Max Hastings in 2002. Photo: Nigel Howard/ANL/Rex Features, via The Guardian
‘The Tory party is about to foist a tasteless joke upon the British people. He cares for nothing but his own fame and gratification’
‘He would not recognise the truth, whether about his private or political life, if confronted by it in an identity parade.’-Max Hastings
Photo:Counterpunch
Soon after Boris Johnson was saved by the NHS heroes from his near death encounter with COVID-19, I wrote him an open letter, inviting him to become a man for the common good, by leaving behind his nasty, leopard-like traits.
Now, given the events since, I must be honest by admitting how foolish I was believing that a leopard is ready to change it’s spots.
However, I still believe that the letter is an excellent reading for all the leopards who might be more amenable to change:
Dear Mr. Johnson, your Covid-19 survival must become a force for good
……
'From the bestselling author of former Waterstones Non-Fiction Book of the Month Dear Life, Breathtaking is a compassionate, heartbreaking and compelling account of an NHS doctor in the midst of the greatest public health crisis in living memory.
How does it feel to confront a pandemic from the inside, one patient at a time? To bridge the gulf between a perilously unwell patient in quarantine and their distraught family outside? To be uncertain whether the protective equipment you wear fits the science or the size of the government stockpile? To strive your utmost to maintain your humanity even while barricaded behind visors and masks?
Rachel is a palliative care doctor who looked after the most gravely unwell patients on the Covid-19 wards of her hospital. Amid the tensions, fatigue and rising death toll, she witnessed the courage of patients and NHS staff alike in conditions of unprecedented adversity. For all the bleakness and fear, she found that moments that could stop you in your tracks abounded. People who rose to their best, upon facing the worst, as a microbe laid waste to the population.
Her new book, Breathtaking, is an unflinching insider's account of medicine in the time of coronavirus. Drawing on testimony from nursing, acute and intensive care colleagues - as well as, crucially, her patients - Clarke argues that this age of contagion has inspired a profound attentiveness to - and gratitude for - what matters most in life.'- Buy this book HERE
……
A selection of related readings from our archive:
Poverty, Destitution, Hunger and Homelessness in the Midst of Plenty
The Broken Economic Model and the Inhumanity of the Lost Decade of Austerity
People’s Tragedy: Neoliberal Legacy of Thatcher and Reagan
The Destruction of our World and the lies of Milton Friedman
Economic Growth: The Index of Misery
Britain today and the Bankruptcy of Ideas, Vision and Values-less Education
‘Why economists kept getting the policies wrong’: Perhaps because they forgot Keynes!
‘What They Forget to Teach You at School’: Fix Education to Fix the World
Detaching Nature from Economics is ‘Burning the Library of Life’
......
Ten Steps to Wise up, Delete and Remove the Nasties and Leopards from Our Lives and to Better the World
Photo: facebook