The influencers of the North. Discuss

Ten years ago The Big Issue in the North published a list of the 50 most influential Northerners. 

Reading it now it feels like a piece of history of a different country, where they do things very differently. I was one of the selection panel and can only look back and laugh now at some of the choices we made. Not because we were wrong, but because the whole premise was built on the primacy of big money and raw power having lasting influence. We said that influence was a broad term, covering economic clout, political power, cultural impact and more. And if the way in which you wield that power is the ability to make change and influence lives, then how the Gods must laugh at such plans now. Our list, made up mostly of white blokes, was not of superior beings who have shaped our destiny since then, but of the modestly successful and wealthy, but also the humbled, and ultimately the powerless and uninfluential; as they have been utterly impotent to arrest the meta trends that have shaped the last decade, for better or for worse.

I picked my way through all of this in last week's Big Issue in the North. Even if this isn't a reason for you to buy it, there's always plenty more true goodness in there. So please take the trouble to buy a copy, either from your local vendor, or via this link.

The link to the piece is now live, here.

When you've had a read, let's have a chat about influence and power in our troubled times.

See you on the other side, see you on the fells

I don't think I've ever felt envy like it. 

There was a Freshwalks today to Alport Castles in the Upper Derwent Valley of the Peak District National Park on this most beautiful of autumn days. 

Obviously I was pleased for friends who were able to take this last opportunity to get out in a small group and be guided on a new route, while I sat isolating at home in our virus pit. It must have been quite emotional, as the description of the walk on the Twitter reveals: "Alport Castles quite simply took the breath away. Howden and Derwent reservoirs also competitively resplendent."

This has really been a driver for me over the last year. Not only getting out and walking the hills, but sharing the experiences safely and responsibly. It's been a journey of personal and collective discovery;  pushing the limits of what I can do, but developing friendships of real depth and trust.

I also went out on quite a few walks independently of Freshwalks though the summer, and predictably, on a couple of occasions, got lost. I'll save a few more stories for this blog-a-day through lockdown.

I shall miss this more than anything else over the next month. Thank you to each and every one of you I've walked with. 

Get this clown out of the White House

I've lived through scores of elections and they always seem very important at the time. But we're going to stop up tonight to watch this one and pray for Biden/Harris to win and get this horrible man out of the White House. I can't think of very much more to say than that. Plenty of other pundits are having their say, but I feel moderately optimistic that sense will prevail. My biggest fear is that Trump won't go quietly and is fermenting a civil war.  Like a lot of narcissistic leaders, it's always about him. 

Music Therapy on Tameside Radio - getting into the groove

So, day two of the daily blog. We've had a good couple of months now of playing two hours of music every Sunday night. As I knew it would do, it's found its rhythm and Neil and I have found out more about each other and what we talk about between songs. It feels good, it feels like we're doing something different, fun and worthwhile.

It all came about last year when we bumped into one another a few days after Mark Hollis died. Neil was one of the first people I'd noticed commenting on him on social media when I'd seen the news when I was with my sons in Berlin. We shared a virtually identical Talk Talk epiphany on different sides of the world, but catching the bass line to Life's What You Make It in a dance floor setting. That's as much as you need to know. I knew then in that conversation, I needed to work with his musical knowledge. I went away not knowing what that would look like, thinking publishing, a TV idea, then the more I had time to think of other times when I've been really happy it took me back to a radio show I did a few guest slots on with my pal Adil Bux in Perth in 1989. I also remembered a show Terry Christian used to do on Sunday nights on Stockport station Imagine FM, Northerners With Attitude, where I don't ever recall him playing a bad song. We're not trying to copy that, far from it, but it always struck me as a very honest show.

One thing led to another, and here we are. Neil came up with the name for the show, Andy Hoyle from Tameside Radio took a punt on us, taught us the tech, and we were off. We try not to overthink it too much but the clue's in the name, we just want to try and use music to get people in a good mental space on a Sunday night. We only have one strict rule - there's no such thing as a guilty pleasure. Neil set the bar for that with his first play list that dropped a delicious Wham B-side Nothing Looks the Same in the Light. Since then we've found remixes and straight up classics from household names and forgotten wonders alike. I can honestly say I've never felt as musically liberated. It's been an absolute journey of discovery, education and thrills. Friends have also got what we're trying to do and made some fantastic suggestions. Keep them coming.

It's great that the station goes out on the internet, but we're now also on Listen Again, or On Demand, so you can listen at leisure. I do keep Spotify play lists, which I share, but they aren't always accurate versions of what we've played and you don't get us.

Let us know what you like, what works, what you might want to hear more of. 

A month in lockdown

A couple of years ago I found it particularly motivating to write a blog a day during the summer lull at work. I decided a couple of days ago that I'd repeat the exercise as our wee family went into our own lockdown after our youngest son came down with COVID-19. It was partly intended as a catharsis because the last lockdown we had to do in September was tough. 

As soon as we got his results we felt far better equipped to deal with it and he felt OK. Back in September I was edging towards a return to work one day a week for team meetings, which Tier 3 has since knocked on the head. Also, we've only actually recorded one of our radio shows from the studio (hope you haven't noticed), but I was worried we wouldn't be able to. And we've been very touched by the generous offers of support and help from friends and neighbours.

Now it turns out that we're all going to be in it together anyway as the whole country is heading for a lockdown. I don't know how that's going to go, but obviously I'm worried about people, especially the young. 

Here's a basic rough list of topics I'll try and get through, but like all good lists of ideas some will drop off and others will pop up.

• Academic writing v journalism
• 24 Hour News
• Our Music Therapy programme
• The Strong Personalities Group
• Family
• Telly
• Labour
• Friends
• All Those Things That Seemed So Important
• Aesthetics
• Devolution and Democracy
• Living with medical conditions
• Welsh Nationalism
• Some book reviews
• Some film reviews
• Folk horror
• Kinder Scout
• Cumberland
• High Intensity Interval Training

 

Coming home to football

So I took my seat on the front row of the main stand at Broadhurst Park, home of FC United of Manchester. I placed my programme, my ticket and my Hollands Pepper Steak Pie in front of me and paused for breath. Some of the Lancaster City substitutes were warming up, knocking the ball back and forth to each other. The tannoy was playing a Jam song, I think, and there was chatter around me about other things than the game we were about to see. And never have I felt happier to be in a football ground.

The last game I'd been to was Blackburn Rovers v Swansea City at the end of February, seven months, two weeks and five days earlier. 

The pie, the Bovril and the smell of football were the first things I sensed. But as the match progressed it was other things that reminded me why watching matches on TV has been no substitute.  It was a decent, physical, boisterous game which ended 1-1. Lancaster should really have won, but you notice so much more by immersing yourself in a game over 90 minutes. You see how players move off the ball, how the bench communicates to them and what the shape of either team is. But even with just 600 people in a tidy new stadium like this, and everyone sensibly observing social distancing, there was a decent enough atmosphere. I never thought I'd enjoy hearing "liner" getting verbals from the home fans as much as I did. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think he enjoyed it too. The players certainly did. There was plenty of good old fashioned shithousery and off the ball niggling for it to rile the home fans. For Lancaster it was one of the bigger crowds they get to play in front of and the players relished it.

That was it really, the collective experience. It's what makes us human and it's what makes football more than a game. Football without fans really is nothing.

And it was another new ground, obviously not one of the 92 (or 91 this season), but the 159th ground I've watched football on.

Warm, welcoming and very, very funny - Matt Forde's Politcally Homeless reviewed

There are some days in your life that stick in your mind for years afterwards.

 

July the 22nd, 2015 is one of them. As was usual back then I hot footed it down to London for an event in Moorgate at the HQ of one of my then clients, but this was different. It wasn't a business do, but a political one, and that was my world that summer. I was pleasantly surprised to be signed into the event by our former babysitter, and good family friend Ciara Hogan, a student at LSE at the time. 

I had a chat to Alison McGovern MP and arranged to meet up, which led to an enduring professional friendship with her husband. I was there with another pal who I'd got closer to over the summer months of the Labour leadership contest and while we were chatting he invited me to his wedding later that year (we're still good mates and he's still married, that's not where this is going). 

The occasion was Tony Blair was speaking. He was trying to get the Labour Party to come to its senses and not elect Jeremy Corbyn. The speech, the interview, the takeaway message was quite brilliant, you might remember it - he said, "if your heart says vote Corbyn, you need a transplant" - but as we all know it was, like most recent political campaigns I've ever been involved in, hopelessly doomed. 

But it was also the first time I saw Matt Forde, who interviewed TB on stage and was everything that day that he's ever been since: warm, welcoming and very, very funny.

I've since seen him do stand up twice live and he just gets better and better, Matt Forde that is, not Tony Blair. You might then have quite rightly guessed that I'm a fan. I've listened to pretty much all of his podcasts and he never ceases to surprise. His interview style is respectful, sharp, but he also invites the subject into a space where they rarely get to go, thus we are treated to rare glimpses of their character and motivations.

Last year, before a gig at The Lowry in Salford, I even managed to interview Matt for a little video I did (and have foolishly deleted) when I was standing in the Euro elections of 2019. I slipped in a podcast joke that he didn't see coming, which was a personal highlight.

He's now got a book out with a title that perfectly sums up my own status, Politically Homeless. 

I devoured it over a weekend, the Saturday of which his team (Nottingham Forest) beat mine (Blackburn Rovers), something to which I was sublimely indifferent to.  

It's more than a memoir, but it tells us a lot about his life. It's not a manifesto for the future, but it's brimming with good ideas. And it's not a handbook for political activists, but the tips are priceless. 

Paul Wright, a lovely bloke who's been selected to contest our local ward for Labour has it on his Christmas list, he told me over Twitter. I'd suggest he read it now. He'll learn not to organise a photocall to clean graffiti off a wall with only Waitrose Evian water to hand; he'll perhaps be comforted that however dysfunctional and fractious Stockport Labour Group is, at least it's not Stoke; and he'll be given a re-affirmation of why Labour activists really, really hate Liberal Democrats (though living round here he knows that already). I'd give Paul my copy but it's signed by Matt and it's going on my political bookshelf next to prized signed tomes by Gordon Brown, Peter Mandelson, Tony Wilson and Andrew Marr. That's how much I liked it.

A few weeks after the Tony Blair event I got to interview someone on that very same stage who had lived an extraordinary life. I remember thinking, how do I get great stories out of a guy who has been played in a Hollywood film by Leonardo di Caprio? I deployed some of Matt's techniques of building a rapport with the audience and realising that sometimes the obvious question everyone is thinking is the best way in.

On top of it all the book is a powerful statement too in favour of the values of the Britain we want to be - warm, welcoming, and funny (have I said that already). So go on, buy it, read it. Whether you're a political anorak like we are, or just want a good laugh, then I guarantee you won't be disappointed.

The conveyor belt of outrage - I've stepped off

I've 'sort of ' disengaged from Twitter. It's become such a festering hell site of anti-nuance, I've decided to observe, rather than participate. I can't quite bring myself to delete my presence, and I do need the platform when I want to punt out a blog (like this) so I'm working through the process of blocking the most aggro people who seem to love loading on to the conveyor belt of outrage, and easing it out of my field of vision.

I just don't need it in my life, so I'm starting the detoxification of my world by withdrawing from the places where the discourse is so shouty and angsty. One of my favourite writers, Ian Leslie, put it well, so I'm going to quote his passage in full: "Public debates are becoming more algorithmic and binary. You must pick one side or another, and when you do, there is always a ready-made script waiting for you to run. When Tory ministers defended Dominic Cummings over his trip to Durham, it wasn’t just what they said that was depressing but how: in a series of near-identical, robotic tweets. More of us are behaving like politicians. Every row on social media is conducted with a set of arguments, slogans and memes that each side – and in binary arguments there can only be two sides – faithfully deploy."

I guess Twitter is where the debate happens, and it's not just about politics, but sport, especially football. Elsewhere, despite the data scraping and social manipulation, I find Facebook to be more carefully curatable. LinkedIn is mostly corporate boosterism, but at least it has some useful well argued content. And Instagram? Ah well, Instagram is my new vice. It may be harmful for young people trying to live up to an aspiration of image perfection, but for me it's the comforting balm of aesthetic comfort and joy. I love the stimulating drip of goodness than oozes onto my feed, mainly outdoor landscapes, but also photos of food, art, weirdness, shoes, jackets, jeans, retro photos and more music ideas for our programme. The universe it creates is one of walks I want to go on - the Camino, the Appalachian trail, the Wainwrights, the Munroes and the peaks of Snowdon - in boots and fleeces I want to wear. It gives me visual recall of cities and open spaces I’ve only got fading memories of, such the gorgeous South of Western Australian and the deep outback, oddities like Tallinn, Berlin, Marseille, rural Italy, Miami and many more. That's what I need in my life, something to look forward to. It's what we all need, frankly. 

Call it escapism, but I’ve done with reality and I’m done with Twitter.

Downtown Den #111 // Michael Taylor in the Downtown Den

I had great pleasure in joining my old friend Frank McKenna in conversation last week. Inevitably, we're having to adapt to all kinds of new event formats during isolation, lockdown and working from home. This was an old fashioned two-way interview, conducted over Zoom.

We covered a lot, spanning the time we've known each other. The state of the regional media, social media, my first novel and the state of fiction, politics, mental health and my job at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Left Out - The Inside Story of Labour Under Corbyn

There are good friends of mine who can't bear to pick up this excellent book and learn more of the inevitable feuds and mishaps within the inner workings of the Leader of the Opposition's Office (LOTO). It's too raw, said one, who worked in a previous Labour government and would be tipped over the edge. Especially as the consequences of this protracted self-indulgence is a destructive Conservative government. 

Anyone who has followed this blog and my own political commentary will know where I stand on all of this. I never thought Jeremy Corbyn was even a suitable candidate for leader, and evidently, neither did he. I never trusted, or liked, his inner sanctum. Quite why I was right in that sentiment howls out of every interview and source that Patrick Maguire and Gabriel Pogrund speak to. And so I look back now and feel there was an inevitability about it all.  

Given we all know how it ends, and that it pretty much confirms every prejudice I had about many of the key people featured in the book, there isn't much that is surprising, but I'll come onto one significant factor shortly.

But though it isn't surprising, it is still shocking. I mean genuinely, gasp inducing, out loud guffawing, jaw dropping, really shocking. There is something on pretty much every page that is worse than anything the writers of the Thick of It could invent. Many other reviewers have picked up on particular standout moments, but mine was the plan to topple Tom Watson just before 2018 conference, a plan that failed because Claudia Webbe was late. Or that Andrew Fisher was upset that Corbyn had a nickname for Seamus Milne, but not him. None of the personalities come out of it particularly well, the accounts of bullying and fawning around the leader are particularly toe curling. 

The whole narrative of the story is built around a number of clumsily enacted catastrophes - internal division, anti-semitism, Labour Live festival, Salisbury, Brexit, parliamentary chicanery and the General Election campaign of 2019. At all points Corbyn's lack of leadership qualities make Labour's dysfunction worse.  All you learn is entirely consistent with the prickly old man we sometimes saw on the news, slamming car doors and demanding of interviewers - "can I finish?"

If behind the scenes at "the Project" resembled a bunch of bickering children, you are left to wonder who the adults were. Diane Abbott seems strangely absent, Len McCluskey lurks around every corner, but one figure emerges as a tragi-hero, John McDonnell. He at least recognises that the left have a moment to make a mark and achieve power, but seems powerless to stop their worst instincts from consuming themselves. I don't actually think there is a great deal between him and his leader on policy issues. It seems amazing to me still that much of the left chose to dig in so damagingly on anti-Semitism. Having put to one side their lifelong opposition to nuclear weapons, Irish republicanism, NATO and nationalising the commanding heights of the economy, it's peculiar that they seemed so militant about this one issue. McDonnell seems to understand the need to triangulate and pick the battles that can be won. It's not "tittle tattle" that caused a serious fracture in the relationships, but a defining characteristic of a politics that wants to stand up for a principle, and one that wants to shape society according to those principles. 

This is a fair, balanced and detailed account that tries to work out what went wrong, from their high watermark of hubris at Glastonbury in 2017 to Keir Starmer thrashing their candidate in the 2020 leadership election. It has a level of introspection that all failed political projects have to subject themselves to, including the one I was briefly involved in that gets a mention, The Independent Group for Change. By overly focusing on the Westminster and LOTO operations and less on the grass roots from where this movement came, it is open to the criticism that it only tells half a story. I don’t think that’s grounds to dismiss this work though, because with leadership comes a deep responsibility to do what you promised. Another history would show how Corbynism inspired hope, then dashed it, across the Labour Party in different local branches and constituency parties, and how that played out on social media. But that would be a different book, albeit one that would still include stories about Claudia Webbe. As John Harris says in his peerless review of this, and another account by someone I don't like, the one group of people that doesn't get a look in, or a hearing, are the voters who were turned off by what was evidently a wholly unappealing rabble.

Postscript: this review by Stephen Bush in the New Statesman is also very good.

Lockdown blues

There was something about the whole country being locked down together that helped us feel we were part of a collective effort to do our bit.

Last week we got the news that one of our sons had been with a mate who'd tested positive. He felt a bit rough and had to get a test before going back to university, which came back positive. We got tested as well and were negative, but rules is rules and we have to isolate for two weeks. I'm not going to lie, it's been horrible. Much as I want to put a stoic face on it, I'm struggling with it. We can't leave the house, Max can't come home on his leave, everything is delivered, and I think the worse of it is that we were edging towards returning to work, college, walks and the gym. And I've had to pre-record from home our second Music Therapy programme, with embarrassingly disastrous consequences.  

But we are healthy and well. No symptoms, no real drama. As ever, Rachel is far more cheery than me and has raised our spirits. We are counting our blessings and very much looking forward to celebrating her birthday this week in a spirit of togetherness. This will pass and we will have a chippy tea to mark the end of our isolation next Friday.

Music Therapy on Tameside Radio

On Sunday nights from 9pm until 11pm me and my mate Neil Summers are going to be playing a few records and telling stories on a new show, Music Therapy on Tameside Radio 103.6 FM. It's a breezy mix of the new and the familiar, designed to end the weekend on a blissed out way. I think of Neil as my far more clued up younger brother, nudging me to appreciate richer, deeper and more exciting music. There's no such thing as a guilty pleasure in our book, just an open mind and a love of great music.

You can listen to us live here. We'll probably get round to setting up a website with mini features, extended interviews and playlists. Possibly.

Massive thanks to Chris Bird and Andy Hoyle at Quest Media for giving us the chance. 

A summer of Telly and Box Sets

It's been the best of times, the worst of times. Staying at home, home cooking, eating local, shopping local, trying to imagine another kind of world out there, beyond the news and the various phases of lockdown. And we've watched lots of telly series. At times I've obsessed, binge watched and barely been able to think of anything else, sometimes diving in and forgetting everything within days.

Here's what I've been watching, the good, the bad and the ugly. 

I'll start with the best thing I've seen and take you through the rest in no particular order, but leaving the absolute worst until last. 

Succession (HBO) managed to be even funnier and more shocking than series one.  A little bit of knowledge of the Murdoch family psycho drama really helps, especially watching the way the series grafts on the sacrifices demanded and the brutal boardroom politics of real life. All that was missing was a cream pie at a government committee hearing. But the acting and the whole way the lives of the worst people in the world are designed and captured was something else. 

The Secrets She Keeps (BBC iPlayer) - a plausible and shocking Australian drama with a predictable finger on the emotional manipulation button. It fairly crudely lathers on the class divide, but it was based on a real case and still has the potential for a follow up series. Also reinforced my firm conviction, gleaned from repeated Australian TV series that their cops are the worst in the world.

Giri Haji - (BBC iPlayer) was good, if a little strange at times. An Anglo-Japanese co-production that probably didn't need to keep reminding us of that. It was a brave attempt to lever in some remarkably off-type genre crossing, some worked, some really didn't. I liked the comic book style for the commentary and the set piece over stylised interactions between mob bosses, but the ballet scene for a showdown just felt odd. Played humour very well in what could have been relentlessly bleak and overly procedural.

Normal People (RTE on BBC iPlayer) really pleasantly surprised me. I wasn't sure what I was expecting, probably a bit of BBC Sunday night middle class right of passage romance, but it was far more than that. Not only was it beautifully shot, tenderly acted and well paced, and I really liked the short episodes, it needed the darker moments to make you properly yearn for the better possibilities. However, we had to shut the curtains in case anyone was shocked by what they might be seeing from the street.

Safe (Netflix) was compelling if a bit ridiculous. Very much like another Harlan Coben adaption The Stranger in both style and delivery (both made locally by Red Productions) and occasional use of locations. Both had the desired twists and turns, but too many red herrings and useless coppers tested my patience by the end. Does no-one in this middle class universe move away? 

The Salisbury Poisonings (BBC) was probably the most heart breaking of all TV dramas, not least because it was based entirely on real events, but never threatened to become an episode of Spooks. It was what happens to the real lives of people caught up in an act of terror. I was particularly cut up about the fate of poor Dawn Sturgess, who this series seemed to go out of its way to generously rescue in death from the grave indignities she suffered in her own short life. I do hope that Tracy Daszkiewicz, the director of public health, has been OK during the pandemic. I've no reason to doubt the portrayal of her as a modest and dedicated civil servant by Anne-Marie Duff. It reflects the hard working reality of thousands of public servants called upon to lead at times of crisis, unglamorous work delivered with bravery, heroism and self-doubt.

The Sinner (Netflix) - we did all three series of this Bill Pullman led "why-dunnit" set in upstate New York and I have to say the first was superb, the second was even better but the third lapsed into the absurd.

The A Word (BBC) did a great job of bringing life and laughter to everyday family life for a third series. I probably enjoyed this series the least of all of them as I grew impatient at the breathless ease with which scenes between the Langdale Valley and Manchester took place with barely a reference to the three hours it takes to get from one to the other. I also spent the whole series awaiting the imminent much hinted at demise of my favourite annoying character (of which there are many). But, overall, tender and messy.

Fear the Walking Dead season 5 (Amazon Prime) - I have waxed lyrical before on the desperate turns of the whole Walking Dead franchise and I'm probably overdue a piece on the whole comic book arc, the direction the main show is going with one delayed season finale to come soon. So while I was hugely sceptical of the potential for a spin off series set in California, I did actually quite like seasons 1-3 of Fear the Walking Dead. The characters of Madison, Nick, Alicia and Strand were an improvement on the nonsense playing out with Rick Grimes and his crew in Georgia around seasons 7 and 8. Daniel Salazar was also one of the best ambiguous good guy/ bad guy characters of the whole universe. Season 4 was all over the place, literally in where it was set, the time jumps which were hard to follow, and the lighting and locations. I don't blame the actors, none of them were unconvincing, it was the whole package. The way things happened with no context, continuity was all over the place, decisions were made with no logic and the whole 'help people' thing was just stupid by the end. Morgan, played by Lennie James, was just boring and annoying when he left The Walking Dead, and he got progressively worse through Season 4 and by season 5, which is by some margin the worst television series I have watched this year, or possibly any year, I actually wanted him to die. The only good thing I have to show for the whole torrid and laughably bad experience (much of which I shuttled forward through) is the sheer unadulterated joy of reading reviews on Fortune's website by the excellent Erik Kain.

 

Rose Hill and the Hyde loop must stay open - fight the power

I was really cross when I heard of plans to suspend train services on the route from Rose Hill Marple to Manchester Piccadilly via Hyde from September to December 2020. Northern Trains, also sneaked out the news in a letter to MPs. Given they are now run by the Department for Transport’s Operator of Last Resort, part of the state, in public ownership, it was particularly galling.

The reason they give is hollow, supposedly it's due to insufficient staffing caused by the need to train for new rolling stock and new recruits. During this period there will be no trains at Rose Hill Marple, Woodley, Hyde Central, Hyde North and Fairfield stations. As a result, frequency will also be cut at Romiley, Guide Bridge and Ashburys. 

For what it's worth this blog fully supports the campaign to stop these plans and is delighted to be supported by the Goyt Valley Rail Users’ Association and all our local MPs along the route, Tory and Labour, and by local Councillors.

Rachel Singer, Chair of the Friends of Rose Hill Station, said “The withdrawal of service is not just inconvenient, it will cause distress and a severe sense of dislocation and disruption to life for many who use the service when we are all struggling to re-establish some routines as lockdown eases. We are also concerned about the many local school pupils who will not be able to use the service just as they return to school at the start the new session. Many of those affected will switch to travelling by car, causing more pollution and congestion. Others will be forced to use less convenient bus and rail services, increasing the pressure on these services and making social distancing harder. Some people will decide not to travel at all, undermining the Government’s efforts to get the economy growing again”.

Chair of the Goyt Valley Rail Users’ Association, Peter Wightman, added “Northern are asking passengers to find other ways to travel, pointing them to local bus services, and to rail stations on the routes from Glossop and from Sheffield via Marple. But this comes when bus services are being reduced, and passengers are already being asked to try to avoid the rail route from Sheffield via Marple due to overcrowding. With capacity on alternative routes being limited due to social distancing, overcrowding may force passengers to find another means of transport, or make it impossible to maintain social distancing.

“The longer this closure goes on, the harder it will be to persuade passengers to come back to rail, working against the aim of making our transport system more sustainable. This also undermines the government’s commitment to rebuild passenger confidence when it took over the running of services across the Northern rail network in March.”

The user groups point out that several thousand people have signed petitions against Northern’s plans in less than a week, and they have created a storm of opposition on social media. The groups are committed to fighting the plans until they are scrapped. 

Build Back Better - webinar with Andy Burnham, the LEP and the Growth Company

I was really pleased to be asked by the Growth Company to host this important webinar with Andy Burnham on Build Back Better - How Greater Manchester can make the best of the challenge of the pandemic and stay true to the ambitions of creating quality jobs, homes and businesses.

Let me know what you think.

Help me out, Charlotte - letters to a Labour activist from the political wilderness

The second in a series of conversations with political activist friends has taken a little longer to produce than I hoped, but following a long chat to Liberal Democrat Stephen Duckworth, here are some ideas and thoughts shared between me and Charlotte Morris, a Councillor and now an Executive member on Bury Borough Council. 

Hi Charlotte,

 

Thanks for agreeing to this. As you know I’ve had a very troubled relationship with the Labour Party. I hated it under Corbyn. In fact I wasn’t that keen on Miliband and I fought a General Election in my home seat on that manifesto. I left when the anti-semitism was out of control and the NEC, the leaders office and local infrastructure of the party was dominated by people I had no interest in working with, or had any desire to see get into power. I supported Ann Coffey, Chuka Umunna and Luciana Berger when they had the courage to leave. I was disappointed more didn’t follow and that an alternative wasn’t possible – and it really isn’t, I get that. 

I also thought that after the general election wipeout that Corbyn could truly own his defeat when it inevitably came. But he hasn’t and the Left were quickly back on social media with a ready made betrayal narrative because they discovered the kind of Whatsapp group I have been in over the last few years. 

And though I can’t for one minute support a Boris Johnson Conservative government, I’m relieved in a way that the government we have now is not the one Jeremy Corbyn may have led. I wasn’t convinced Kier Starmer would be able to shape Labour into an electoral force, but I think he’s made a very good start. To be clear, despite three seperate messages from Labour MPs urging me to 'come home' as Starmer was elected, I don’t really see the point of rejoining and yet, at the same time, I think our society is faced with an opportunity to really change and emerge from this terrible virus and the economic catastrophe with a better heart and a sense of common purpose. I know that’s a bit of an offload, but I value your view.

 

Cheers,

 

Michael 

------------------

Hi Michael,

 

Sorry for not getting back to you sooner on this. Given I’ve kept you waiting for a response, I won’t hang about. Let’s get to the nub of the issue; you’re looking for someone to give you reasons to re-join the Labour Party. 

 

Well, sorry to disappoint, but I’m not going to indulge you in that.

 

I’m not really sure you should re-join. You said yourself in your email you “don’t see the point”. So why are you even considering it? 

 

Seeing as we both work for esteemed academic institutions, I’ve done a bit of Google bashing and it turns out there is plenty of clever sounding academic thought around why people join political parties. The ‘General Incentives Model’ (Seyd and Whiteley, 1992) is a widely accepted approach to understanding why people become active in political parties. So why don’t we start there?

 

This model outlines the following reasons why people take up membership of political parties:

 

- Perception that participation will achieve a desired collective outcome.

- A desire to see particular policies introduced. 

- Selective benefits of membership e.g. material or career benefits. 

- The intrinsic pleasure of political engagement. 

- Altruistic motivations. 

- A desire to conform to social norms and behaviour and expectation of personal contacts. 

- Personal affection for a party and / or leader. 

 

(Isn’t it amazing what you can learn after a few minutes on Google, by the way …)

I don’t profess to you know you super well, but we’ve shared many conversations about politics over many brews over the past couple of years, so if you don’t mind I will make a couple of observations on what I think motivates you. Please tell me if I’m off base.

 

I think you are fascinated by politics, see it as the vehicle to achieving things that make the world a better place and enjoy the intellectual stimulation of being involved in political debate. You’re not a Tory. Not even a shy one, I don’t think. You’ve got too much water under the bridge locally with the Lib Dems. And that lot you had a brief dalliance with last year are no more (hurrah!).

 

You’re politically engaged, but politically homeless.

 

Perhaps you could consider the motivations for joining a political party against your own feelings of the Labour Party in its current form. Ask yourself why you want to be a member of a political party at all and what you want from that membership, and then you might start to find your answer as to whether that party should be Labour. I’d be interested to know what you come up with.  

 

I know I could have used this email to tell you all the reasons why you should come back. Anti-Semitism will be stamped out once and for all. We’re going to focus on winning elections, not just the argument. The Shadow Cabinet and its diverse talent shows the ambition the Party has. Sir Keir Starmer’s hair. The truth is I don’t think you should have left in the first place and I’m not too sure I want to legitimise that decision by saying “it’s alright now, we’re back to normal and you can return to the fold”.

 

It somehow normalises the idea that those who resigned in protest at anti-Semitism were morally right. And that those who didn’t were morally wrong. How can you support a racist Party? Why won’t you take a stand? How can you ask people to vote for that man? My membership of the Labour Party certainly has caused me issues with people I love at times over the past couple of years. It’s been hard to justify. And I accept that. I know that for those who quit, like you, it wasn’t an easy decision. And at times, neither was deciding to stay. But ultimately I believe that my values are in line with those of the Labour Party and those who espouse anti-Semitism in the name of the Party or in the name of the Leader are the ones that are out of step.  

 

I think ultimately what you need to ask yourself is do you think the Labour Party best represents your values and is it the best vehicle for seeing those values put into action?

 

But don’t forget, with your chequered past, the big question isn’t whether you should re-join the Party, it’s whether we’d have you. 

 

Speak soon. 

 

Charlotte 

 

------------------

Very good, Charlotte. Maybe we should have carried on talking about our pets.

 

I’m not all surprised you’ve cut to the chase and put the hard word down about joining. You’re right, but I thought I made it clear I’m not joining, and I think I’m probably done with parties. Not least because you raise the obvious issue that they wouldn’t have me anyway. So let’s park that thought for now.

 

There’s an element of the last five years that I still find troubling though. In an effort to keep the party together plenty of people kept their heads down and didn’t speak out against the basket of deplorables that presided over the most shameful political leadership of a major party in our country’s history. There’s a sense now that papering over the shame can suddenly make everything OK. It’s fine to laud Keir Starmer now with his impressive words and deeds and his grown up approach to political management, and his forensic and calm dissembling of Boris Johnson at PMQs is masterful, but there are going to be sterner tests when the EHRC publish their report that WILL declare Labour to have been institutionally racist. 

 

Anything less than a sweeping of the stables, withdrawl of the whip, expulsions and firm statements of intent, will render any attempts to reach beyond that current base utterly redundant. 

 

I put it back to you then, what should non-aligned, non-partisan community activists do? How do parties seek to coalesce allies with whom they find common cause around campaigns. Maybe later we can think about what Build Back Better might mean and how you and I as various elements of our personas - Councillor, University execs, community activists – can imagine that at local, regional, national, global level. 

 

Ta,

 

Michael

------------------

Michael,

The past five years is all I’ve known as a Labour Party member. I joined in the summer of 2015 following the General Election defeat. As a political observer both personally and professionally I’d never really felt party political and certainly not tribal, but by the time the exit poll came in I had had enough of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition (I’d voted Lib Dem in 2010, don’t tell anyone, we were all young once). I was absolutely gutted that Labour wasn’t going to be able to form a minority or coalition government. Maybe it was the heady days of the Milifandom and we all got a bit carried away with ourselves (I confess I came for the memes, but stayed for the politics). Regardless, there wasn’t much I didn’t agree with the Labour Party on and I wanted to see the Party win. Ed Miliband wasn’t perfect nor was that manifesto, but much of it spoke to me at that time and, actually, still does. 

 

So to have gone from non-party political and very non-tribal to suddenly being a member of a political party that has been tearing itself limb from limb in a factional war for the past half a decade has been a bit disconcerting to say the least. I can’t disagree with you that Corbyn’s tenure has brought shame to the Labour Party and I tried to explain briefly why I stayed with the Party even though I felt that way in my previous reply. 

 

But I don’t agree that by moving forward in the way that the Party is doing now we are somehow papering over the cracks. Following a meeting with Keir Starmer after he was elected leader, the Board of Deputies said he achieved more in four days more than his predecessor had in four years. That’s a good start and there is much more that needs to be done; I agree that we need action. I guess it’s the old “the proof of the pudding is in the eating” and we shall await the publication of the EHRC report and judge Keir Starmer’s response accordingly. 

 

Beyond political parties, community activism is alive and well. In my own ward where I’m a councillor I’m lucky enough to know and work with a number of really proactive, passionate and dedicated community groups. These are non-party political although the people that run them have political views and in some cases party allegiances. They come in different forms, from a volunteer-led community centre to local litter picking groups, and from a traditional residents’ association to a constituted ‘Friends of’ group that hopes to take over management of the local country park. I don’t think they’d call themselves ‘activists’ as I don’t think they see themselves as campaigners, but they are making a real difference in their communities and isn’t that the ultimate aim of activism?

 

So to answer your question, what do non-aligned, non-partisan community activists do? You find something in your community that you’re not happy with or that you think could be improved, you get a group of like-minded people together and you take action. In today’s society with social media and the multitude of ways in which we can stay connected, this is easier than ever. 

 

Ultimately, however, a degree of political engagement will be required, but political engagement doesn’t have to be aligned or partisan either. 

 

A great example of successful community activism, again from my patch in Bury, has been seen around the climate emergency. The Council passed a climate emergency in July 2019. In response a local group, Bury Climate Action, was set up. They’ve got engaged, got online, got in our faces by asking questions at Full Council, held meetings and asked us to attend, and they’ve lobbied local councillors to take appropriate action. They’ve put pressure on us. Asked us hard questions. And we’ve had to find answers. They’ve changed the debate and held us to account on our promises. 

I hope that answers your question. 

Cheers,

Charlotte 

 

 

Under appreciated genius

>


I've been thinking a lot about what might have been. But also listening to a wide range of new music at a time when venues like Gorilla were at risk of closing, Q Magazine is nearing the end, and artists are staring into the abyss. Before all of that though, here are some massively unappreciated geniuses.

The one above is a towering anthem of melancholy from Gavin Clark, Good Day to Die, from the album Crazy on the Weekend by Sunhouse. In his A&R days author John Niven looked after Gavin when he was a brittle and sensitive singer songwriter at a time when the music market demanded brash and confident at the tail end of Britpop. Although you might recognise his tone and key from This is England soundtracks and various indie films, Gavin never broke through with any of his bands, Sunhouse or Clayhill. He died a few years ago in sad circumstances. Here's a heartbreaking and beautifully written obituary John Niven wrote in the Daily Record which captures him painfully well and a film his friend Shane Meadows made with Gavin in his living room. Maybe you could read the obituary while you play Good Day to Die, or just the whole of the album to be honest.

I went to see I Am Kloot a few times and was touched by the wall of affection from an appreciative audience of people like us. I noticed that singer John Bramwell was due to tour again just as lockdown kicked in. That’s going to be top of my list when this is over. Support venues, support artists, and no, just downloading on Spotify won’t be enough will it?

You couldn’t download this next track if you wanted to, as it’s not on Spotify.  Flowered Up, or the Cockney Mondays as they were known at the time (by me) had an incredible energy about them and (heresy, I know) I genuinely think Weekender is far better than anything the baggy Mancs ever came up with. It's a sprawling, multi-layered, epic non-anthemic classic. Behind it is another tragic story of a talent lost and the subject of what I hear is a very good book. This here, about them, nails it and the epic lost brilliance of Weekender.

For a slightly happier ending, David Ford is at least still with us, but nowhere near the status he deserves. I'm fairly stuck on one of his earlier albums, Let the Hard Times Roll, but I'm not here to judge, just to share. I'd start with To Hell With The World, but maybe cheer yourself up with Making up For Lost Time. I just don't understand why everyone doesn't know these songs like I do. Life's better for it.

Let it happen

I found this old photo taken of me in 1989 when I was the editor of a fashion magazine in Australia, sat staring out of the window of the L'Alba Cafe in Northbridge, WA, possibly one of my all time favourite neighbourhood hangouts. 

Strangely, I've been taken back to that time and place by the song below - Let it Happen by Tame Impala. Written and performed by Kevin Parker who grew up in WA, but will have been 3 years old at the time, it seems to capture that anxious feeling of the world of possibilities and excitement. The added ingredient for me is the sense of dislocation from home, and that I'm not meant to be laying down roots and making plans here, I'm in a foreign land. Hence the most critical line is this - "If I never come back, tell my mother I'm sorry". 

There's also a loop in the song where it momentarily sounds like the disc is stuck, before the burst that breaks that loop finds another settled rhythm and then a complex harmony of two vocal tracks competing for your attention. There's a lot going on, but it's ultimately uplifting.

I often think about those 'Sliding Doors' moments of big life decisions, and deciding to return to Britain was just such a time for me, especially the crushing sense of struggle and uncertainty, loneliness and rotten English weather that followed, taking me a couple of years to find my groove in London. 

Where would the friendships, relationships and opportunities in Australia have taken me? How much more chicken mango or Greek salad could I have eaten at L'Alba, or Vietnamese noodles from this takeaway in Highgate? Would I have grown out of dance music and clubbing in Perth as quickly as I did in London? Maybe I quit while I was ahead? Obviously I don't wish away the happy marriage and the wonderful children I've fathered, and I would always have wanted to have landed here.

I've been doing a lot of looking back lately and thinking about where my own sons will go in the world and how I'll feel about that. Maybe it's because the world has got so much smaller during lockdown, shrinking our literal horizons, but expanding our sense of responsibility. 

Let it Happen

It's always around me, all this noise
But not nearly as loud as the voice saying
"Let it happen, let it happen (It's gonna feel so good)
Just let it happen, let it happen"

All this running around
Trying to cover my shadow
An ocean growing inside
All the others seem shallow
All this running around
Bearing down on my shoulders
I can hear an alarm
Must be a warning

I heard about a whirlwind that's coming 'round
It's gonna carry off all that isn't bound
And when it happens, when it happens (I'm gonna be holding on)

So let it happen, let it happen

All this running around

I can't fight it much longer
Something's trying to get out
And it's never been closer
If my take-off fails
Make up some other story
If I never come back
Tell my mother I'm sorry

I will not vanish and you will not scare me
Try to get through it, try to bounce to it
All the while thinking I might as well do it
They be lovin' someone and I'm not that stupid
Take the next ticket to take the next train
Why would I do it? And you wanna think that

I will not vanish and you will not scare me
Try to get through it, try to bounce to it
All the while thinking I might as well do it
They be lovin' someone and I'm not that stupid
Take the next ticket to take the next train
Why would I do it? And you wanna think that

I will not vanish and you will not scare me
Try to get through it, try to bounce to it
All the while thinking I might as well do it
They be lovin' someone and I'm not that stupid
Take the next ticket to take the next train
Why would I do it? And you wanna think that

I will not vanish and you will not scare me
Try to get through it, try to bounce to it
All the while thinking I might as well do it
They be lovin' someone and I'm not that stupid
Take the next ticket to take the next train
Why would I do it? And you wanna think that

Oh, maybe I was ready all along
Oh, maybe I was ready all along
Oh, maybe all I wanted was the sound
Oh but maybe I was ready all along

Songwriters: Kevin Parker

Let It Happen lyrics © BMG Rights Management

An introduction to the future

Every day we seem to lurch from one example of our crisis of leadership and trust, to another. I'm not alone in feeling adrift, confused, and searching for purpose, but whatever else is going on it doesn’t have to be one of crushed personal responsibility and accountability. This pandemic and the ensuing lockdown has been a shock to the collective system and to individual hopes and dreams.

I hardly stand unique in this country at my disgust and horror at how the most impressive collective contribution of sacrifice and civic spirit was frittered away by a lethal amateurism. It is a time of intense national shame. Yet organisations and individuals across our country have displayed leadership, generosity and a capability to contribute to the common good, and it is from them that we must take inspiration in order to contribute to a rebuilding of trust.

Many of us are determined the inevitable change should be positive, and a few of us have been knocking ideas around. For me, this arose from a small group of us from within the Freshwalks hiking group. We were split into smaller groups to support one another during lockdown and see where it took us. We've done OK, I think. We've shared a lot, helped one another and enjoyed the experience. I knew one of the others quite well, another a bit, one used to work with Rachel years ago, and the final chap, not at all. I'd say we've been through a fair bit together since and know each other pretty well now. 

Let me start with my own state of mind.

I’m one of those people on the divide in society that has been able to work from home.  I’m not going to complain about that, because others have suffered far worse symptoms than the new blight of being all Zoomed out. We've done alright at home, eating together, I exercise regularly, Rachel's done well with her work, raising money for people in crisis.

But while I’ve got a lot done - finally written an MSc thesis - I’ve also drifted and dithered. I’ve wondered how I can make a meaningful contribution to my work, and to making the world better, to know what I’m doing in my job, and that it matters. In reviewing things I’ve written and read, there’s an awful lot of nostalgia. From that comes a melancholy about what I’ve missed out on. I think we look back because there’s precious little to look forward to. The promise of the future as a better place is an uncertain one now.

I have three impatient words written on the opening page of my work journal – the book where I take notes at meetings and where I write ideas down. It just says – does it matter? Frankly, at the moment, it doesn’t always feel like much does; but it must.  I want to articulate a bold sweep of key actions and behaviours that can and should take place as we emerge out of lockdown to contribute in our own way to Build Back Better, it can’t happen just by willing it so.

And much as I muse at a policy level - I literally wrote a thesis on it - it's at a personal level that I have had similar moments of clarity that have looked at the ticking clock of life and thought – I no longer have the patience to work with unpleasant people. I think part of me has always done this. I've definitely been guilty of discriminating in favour of working with people who crack on, get stuff done, work at a pace I do and share my values. I described it recently as finding a golden thread of good people. However, I’m also aware that has come across in the past as 'picking favourites'. But for many emerging from this terrible pandemic and the recession to come, we’re going into a severe economic situation where plenty of us will be content to work for anyone, assholes included. Therefore it also places an even greater importance on those of us who can discriminate to build alliances with the good, the kind, the generous.

Here, then, are my three thoughts on where I think I must go:

All of us who can must double our commitment to get on and do stuff - I think of what Matthew Taylor at the RSA described as the need to 'make power, not take power'. Not require power to be given to us, but demonstrate we are effective community leaders and actors, capable of using the skills, efforts and capacity we have to make change. It’s not a substitute for gaining real power, but it’s a step towards it.

Secondly, more than ever, we need to build alliances. I’m in a community of people loosely based around our hiking group, Freshwalks. It’s but a small example of how we can support one another. It's not the solution to the world's problems, but right now as a collective it works for me. So does the People's Powerhouse, the RSA, my Church, other networks I'm part of, and the links I've built through my work. Our whole world is volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) and obviously plenty of people say this, repeatedly. But maybe within that we have to understand there are things beyond our control and decisions made that we don’t like and that our response has to be messy too. So to counter that feeling of helplessness we need to ask the right questions, not always to try to provide all the answers, and only through thinking through a potential answer with others, will we be able to make progress.

Thirdly, we must never be afraid to think big, and realise it’s not just for us. I’ve stumbled across something called “Cathedral thinking” the idea that you are creating something you may never see built in your lifetime. Greta Thunberg has talked about it, apparently, which is fine with me. Submitting yourself to the pursuit of a big idea. 

The bottom line is a revolution in spirit, in kindness, in a new conception of how we live our lives in relation not only to each other, but to nature, to our air, our rivers and seas and a different understanding of how our land is our common treasury. I've said so many times that happiness is about spending time with the people you love, but it's also about knowing you are living your life as close as possible to your own sacred values. Mine are to be honest, be loyal, be kind. When I fall short on any of them, it crushes me. So I need personal strength, but also that of others, to uphold those pillars.  

Where we individually go with that I genuinely don't know. The answer to the question of "what we do" isn't actually as important as the why?

Tracey Thorn's Another Planet - we were all young once and not very nice

It took me far too long to read this delightful and insightful memoir of a suburban childhood, bought for me by my dear friend John Dixon who has over the years opened my eyes and ears to routinely enriching books and music. 

Maybe lockdown has made us all more reflective. I've certainly found nostalgia very appealing, even more so than usual. 

The structure veers between the 1970s and 2016 and a nostalgic return to Brookman's Park in Hertfordshire where she grew up. The fact that you know the happy ending - Tracey's career as a singer songwriter and her own family life (I'm an avid reader of her fortnightly Off The Record column in the New Statesman, by the way) doesn't change anything; there's no revelation or a gotcha moment. 

It brought back all kinds of memories of discos, experimenting with alcohol and girls, getting into scrapes and the emerging music of the time. But the strongest reminder I got was that teenagers aren't terribly nice, and regard their long suffering parents either with disdain, or not at all. Whenever I've tried to place myself in the world of my own sons and reverted to how my magnificent parents behaved, my memories are almost entirely bereft of them. And yet who picked me up from the Hornby village disco at 10pm before starting work the next day at 5 am? And that I habitually lied to them about where I was, who I was with and what I was doing. I'm just relieved I didn't have a diary to cross reference as Tracey has, I wince at the thought.

More than anything though, it is a tenderly written book, tinged with appreciation and sharp social and cultural observations. As John reminded me of Paddy McAloon's thoughts on the matter: "the sweet sweet songs that cloud your eyes (pause) nostalgia supplies."