Mebyon Kernow’s Leader, Cllr Dick Cole, blogged yesterday about the election to the French Parliament of Paul Molac, the first Breton autonomist to make that breakthrough, albeit with valuable support from the Greens and the Socialists.
His victory comes after the success of the Union Démocratique Bretonne in elections to the Brittany Regional Council in 2004 and 2010, winning three seats on the first occasion and four on the second. The regional council is a fake that covers four-fifths of Brittany, a bit like the ‘South West’ zone this side of the water, but Breton activists are showing how even the wrong answers can be captured and steered towards the right ones.
Another of our neighbours, the Mouvement Normand, has shown the potential of the Internet to take their message direct to the public with their web-based compilation ‘TVNC’ (TVNormanChannel). There can be no doubt that this is the way forward, probably in our case starting with small items for YouTube that can be linked to from our existing web presence. Much as the SNP, Plaid Cymru and Mebyon Kernow have all done.
Will Wessex join the regionalist boat, now leaving with our neighbours on board on a rising tide, or will it be left behind beneath the centralist boot?
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Themes, Memes & Ideology
“Not just the mere organization of a new party is becoming increasingly difficult – so is the expression of a new political idea or doctrine. Ideas no longer exist except through the media of information. When these are in the hands of the existing parties, no truly revolutionary or new doctrine has any chance to express itself, i.e., to exist. Yet innovation was one of the principal characteristics of democracy. Now, because nobody wants it any longer, it tends to disappear.”
Jacques Ellul, Propaganda: The Formation of Men’s Attitudes (1973)
Regular readers will know that this blog has certain regular themes. Most fundamental is the localist and regionalist conception of democracy, coupled with a constant critique of the London-chauvinist, egocentric and militaristic thinking denying us the happier world we should all be enjoying.
A second group of themes links Peak Oil, food supply, population, sustainable transport and the long-term agrarian perspective. We aim to take a realistic view, rejecting both the head-in-the-sand, business-as-usual approach and the hopeful hippy idea that if we leave well alone it will all work itself out in the end without anyone getting hurt.
Last, but by no means least, is the theme of unjust possession, especially of money and land. Along with this, we oppose the Thatcherite cult of private property as an end in itself, and her abandonment of any attempt to define the common good by civic means. We envision economic life as a co-operative, not competitive or exploitative endeavour, and one in which quality and local distinctiveness are both highly cherished.
These are themes that have emerged in our discussions about the future of Wessex. There may be others we haven’t thought of. Maybe we put too much emphasis on some of the themes we already have. We are always open to feedback. We aim to provide quality in terms of the range and depth of posts here, and also their tone. Occasionally, a more strident note will be sounded, on juxtaposing the urgency of the problems, the simplicity of the solutions and the sheer lack of imagination that prevents them meeting up.
The themes above are all ones we view as vital to any self-governing Wessex worth having, one which is aware of the issues and knows where it’s going. But they’re not what defines the Wessex project, since they’re all about analysis and direction, in the abstract, not a fleshing-out of the new structures through which a fresh approach can be delivered. We believe in Wessex as one part of a more streamlined and sustainable system of government than the UK as presently constituted. Devolution has unleashed the potential of Scotland and Wales, long suppressed by the London regime. We are eager to join the achievers.
Wessex itself is more ‘meme’ than ‘theme’. It’s an idea with something for everyone, whether you love dialect, make T-shirts and car stickers, market holidays here, or are just impatient for the future to arrive. We are passionate about the Wessex dimension to our policies. That can mean building a Wessex-oriented transport system in place of one driven by London’s priorities. It can mean taking control of our seabed to harness the energy potential of tides, waves and wind for our benefit. It can mean feeding ourselves, not housing London’s overspill. Getting the meme ‘out there’, getting folk to ‘think Wessex, and why not?’ is something worth being passionate about. It’s the only way to make it stick and grow, so that Labour can’t go around re-inventing regionalism every 20 years as a convenient diversion, and as if it had no back story. The best guide to the memes and sub-memes we need to propagate is Celtic nationalism. We don’t have to become nationalists, or acquire uncritically, to learn from what works elsewhere.
A number of posts have explored our political philosophy, that is to say, what informs what we think ought to happen. We also need to become aware once again of the need for ideology, of the need to be on our guard against what must NOT happen, of what threatens those things we hold dear and against which we must not be afraid to speak out. An example given recently is the financial decapitation that has repeatedly robbed Wessex of an independent regional banking sector.
Although we are told that we live in a post-ideological world, that is just another way of saying that we live inside the ideology that won. Which is why any other way of looking at the world, any assertion of other values, gets dismissed as unreality. The political value of history is that it tells us that there are other ways. They’re history because, applied as a whole, they failed. But elements of them, proclaimed and applied under new conditions, can still represent a more promising future to go back to than persisting with a status quo whose own success is now seriously called into question. Pushing against the weight of that status quo is what ideology is for.
Jacques Ellul, Propaganda: The Formation of Men’s Attitudes (1973)
Regular readers will know that this blog has certain regular themes. Most fundamental is the localist and regionalist conception of democracy, coupled with a constant critique of the London-chauvinist, egocentric and militaristic thinking denying us the happier world we should all be enjoying.
A second group of themes links Peak Oil, food supply, population, sustainable transport and the long-term agrarian perspective. We aim to take a realistic view, rejecting both the head-in-the-sand, business-as-usual approach and the hopeful hippy idea that if we leave well alone it will all work itself out in the end without anyone getting hurt.
Last, but by no means least, is the theme of unjust possession, especially of money and land. Along with this, we oppose the Thatcherite cult of private property as an end in itself, and her abandonment of any attempt to define the common good by civic means. We envision economic life as a co-operative, not competitive or exploitative endeavour, and one in which quality and local distinctiveness are both highly cherished.
These are themes that have emerged in our discussions about the future of Wessex. There may be others we haven’t thought of. Maybe we put too much emphasis on some of the themes we already have. We are always open to feedback. We aim to provide quality in terms of the range and depth of posts here, and also their tone. Occasionally, a more strident note will be sounded, on juxtaposing the urgency of the problems, the simplicity of the solutions and the sheer lack of imagination that prevents them meeting up.
The themes above are all ones we view as vital to any self-governing Wessex worth having, one which is aware of the issues and knows where it’s going. But they’re not what defines the Wessex project, since they’re all about analysis and direction, in the abstract, not a fleshing-out of the new structures through which a fresh approach can be delivered. We believe in Wessex as one part of a more streamlined and sustainable system of government than the UK as presently constituted. Devolution has unleashed the potential of Scotland and Wales, long suppressed by the London regime. We are eager to join the achievers.
Wessex itself is more ‘meme’ than ‘theme’. It’s an idea with something for everyone, whether you love dialect, make T-shirts and car stickers, market holidays here, or are just impatient for the future to arrive. We are passionate about the Wessex dimension to our policies. That can mean building a Wessex-oriented transport system in place of one driven by London’s priorities. It can mean taking control of our seabed to harness the energy potential of tides, waves and wind for our benefit. It can mean feeding ourselves, not housing London’s overspill. Getting the meme ‘out there’, getting folk to ‘think Wessex, and why not?’ is something worth being passionate about. It’s the only way to make it stick and grow, so that Labour can’t go around re-inventing regionalism every 20 years as a convenient diversion, and as if it had no back story. The best guide to the memes and sub-memes we need to propagate is Celtic nationalism. We don’t have to become nationalists, or acquire uncritically, to learn from what works elsewhere.
A number of posts have explored our political philosophy, that is to say, what informs what we think ought to happen. We also need to become aware once again of the need for ideology, of the need to be on our guard against what must NOT happen, of what threatens those things we hold dear and against which we must not be afraid to speak out. An example given recently is the financial decapitation that has repeatedly robbed Wessex of an independent regional banking sector.
Although we are told that we live in a post-ideological world, that is just another way of saying that we live inside the ideology that won. Which is why any other way of looking at the world, any assertion of other values, gets dismissed as unreality. The political value of history is that it tells us that there are other ways. They’re history because, applied as a whole, they failed. But elements of them, proclaimed and applied under new conditions, can still represent a more promising future to go back to than persisting with a status quo whose own success is now seriously called into question. Pushing against the weight of that status quo is what ideology is for.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Money to Burn
In the midst of ‘austerity’, the Coalition has gone shopping for new submarines, from which to launch WMDs against the morally challenged. The purchase price comes to at least £20 billion: that’s £3 billion already spent, £3 billion committed and £14 billion awaiting clearance as the ‘now too costly to cancel’ argument. On top of this, there are annual running costs of £1.5 billion.
The Coalition’s challenge is to explain why this makes sense, to anyone but their own armchair A-bombers. Why an ‘independent’ nuclear deterrent achieves anything. Why grown men should patrol the oceans awaiting a surprise attack by an ‘enemy’ we no longer have, or maybe haven’t invented yet. Perhaps occasionally crossing paths with subs from other countries engaged in the same pointless activity. Protecting jobs in the defence industries – in this case largely outside Wessex – is clearly a significant political consideration but protecting jobs that do more harm than good only inhibits their replacement by better ones.
We’re told that replacing Trident is an ‘investment’. We’d like to know the annual rate of return then. Or some quantification of the extra security we gain that the Swedes or the Swiss lack, with such obviously devastating consequences for their quality of life. Given the resources the planet is called upon to sacrifice to this and similar projects, might it not be better value, as well as safer, just to heap the money in the middle of the street and set fire to it all?
The Coalition’s challenge is to explain why this makes sense, to anyone but their own armchair A-bombers. Why an ‘independent’ nuclear deterrent achieves anything. Why grown men should patrol the oceans awaiting a surprise attack by an ‘enemy’ we no longer have, or maybe haven’t invented yet. Perhaps occasionally crossing paths with subs from other countries engaged in the same pointless activity. Protecting jobs in the defence industries – in this case largely outside Wessex – is clearly a significant political consideration but protecting jobs that do more harm than good only inhibits their replacement by better ones.
We’re told that replacing Trident is an ‘investment’. We’d like to know the annual rate of return then. Or some quantification of the extra security we gain that the Swedes or the Swiss lack, with such obviously devastating consequences for their quality of life. Given the resources the planet is called upon to sacrifice to this and similar projects, might it not be better value, as well as safer, just to heap the money in the middle of the street and set fire to it all?
Monday, June 18, 2012
Devon’s Difference
Racial purity is a fancy term for in-breeding. Those who like that sort of thing will carry on doing it. And those who don’t, won’t. In a free society, politicians shouldn’t normally be that bothered either way.
Genetics becomes politicised when it is used to bolster or attack treasured historic identities. Such identities should be strong enough not to need bolstering but it is always gratifying when those who deny the legitimacy of these identities are dealt a heavy blow by objective evidence. This month, new research was reported showing how the DNA of Cornwall differs from that of Devon or, put from the Wessex perspective, how the DNA of Devon differs from that of Cornwall.
A decade ago, the Wessex movement online was subjected to a hefty amount of trolling by a couple of egregious folk asserting Devon to be a ‘lost’ Celtic nation and noisily denying that it had ever been an integral part of Wessex. In fact, of course, the documentary evidence is that Devon became Saxon at a relatively early date and, just as clearly, that Cornwall did not. Only those will be fooled who want to be fooled: beware the DeVonci Code.
Who put them up to it? Labour and UKIP are both suspects, as they both had a vested interest in destroying any viable alternative to the ‘South West’ zone. Labour, because this would make it easier to impose their regional vision, in the demented belief that they were doing good. UKIP, because it would make it easier to oppose any regional vision, in the equally demented belief that its roots lie in Brussels.
We cannot touch upon this subject without mentioning the tendency of some Cornish to make counter-productive noises. The loudest is that the whole of Devon was Cornish in King Athelstan’s reign. It certainly wasn't. The evidence as a whole is that the Tamar was already the border in Alfred’s day, to be not defined but rather confirmed and enforced by his grandson. Athelstan the Bastard deserves a better press than he gets, especially from the Cornish.
The historical relationship between Cornwall and Wessex needs to be much better understood for all kinds of reasons. The more one delves into what is recorded, what is claimed, and what is simply wishful thinking, the more one reaches the conclusion that no area of international history outside eastern Europe has been so poorly served. Not just by deeply flawed attempts at popularisation but by the obstructive politicisation of the underlying scholarship itself. The fault does not always lie with the scholars. Key historical documents remain locked up in the Duchy of Cornwall offices, still ‘commercially sensitive’ after 700 years. The creation of a Cornish National Library, recently mooted, ought to be the opportunity to make them available in Cornwall to all concerned. And these include Wessaxons as much as the Cornish: the Duchy has always been a much larger landowner in Wessex than in Cornwall itself. Tug your forelock as you may though, it won’t happen in today’s society and that really does take the organic biscuit.
In the past and in the present, the truth about both has been concealed in order to facilitate oppression. In the future, as soon as possible, it needs to be exposed in order to facilitate justice.
Genetics becomes politicised when it is used to bolster or attack treasured historic identities. Such identities should be strong enough not to need bolstering but it is always gratifying when those who deny the legitimacy of these identities are dealt a heavy blow by objective evidence. This month, new research was reported showing how the DNA of Cornwall differs from that of Devon or, put from the Wessex perspective, how the DNA of Devon differs from that of Cornwall.
A decade ago, the Wessex movement online was subjected to a hefty amount of trolling by a couple of egregious folk asserting Devon to be a ‘lost’ Celtic nation and noisily denying that it had ever been an integral part of Wessex. In fact, of course, the documentary evidence is that Devon became Saxon at a relatively early date and, just as clearly, that Cornwall did not. Only those will be fooled who want to be fooled: beware the DeVonci Code.
Who put them up to it? Labour and UKIP are both suspects, as they both had a vested interest in destroying any viable alternative to the ‘South West’ zone. Labour, because this would make it easier to impose their regional vision, in the demented belief that they were doing good. UKIP, because it would make it easier to oppose any regional vision, in the equally demented belief that its roots lie in Brussels.
We cannot touch upon this subject without mentioning the tendency of some Cornish to make counter-productive noises. The loudest is that the whole of Devon was Cornish in King Athelstan’s reign. It certainly wasn't. The evidence as a whole is that the Tamar was already the border in Alfred’s day, to be not defined but rather confirmed and enforced by his grandson. Athelstan the Bastard deserves a better press than he gets, especially from the Cornish.
The historical relationship between Cornwall and Wessex needs to be much better understood for all kinds of reasons. The more one delves into what is recorded, what is claimed, and what is simply wishful thinking, the more one reaches the conclusion that no area of international history outside eastern Europe has been so poorly served. Not just by deeply flawed attempts at popularisation but by the obstructive politicisation of the underlying scholarship itself. The fault does not always lie with the scholars. Key historical documents remain locked up in the Duchy of Cornwall offices, still ‘commercially sensitive’ after 700 years. The creation of a Cornish National Library, recently mooted, ought to be the opportunity to make them available in Cornwall to all concerned. And these include Wessaxons as much as the Cornish: the Duchy has always been a much larger landowner in Wessex than in Cornwall itself. Tug your forelock as you may though, it won’t happen in today’s society and that really does take the organic biscuit.
In the past and in the present, the truth about both has been concealed in order to facilitate oppression. In the future, as soon as possible, it needs to be exposed in order to facilitate justice.
Friday, June 15, 2012
A Stitch In Time
We remain firmly opposed to the wave upon wave of London overspill housing that is changing the character of our region for the worse. (And destroying in the process the very things that settlers find attractive.) That’s not to say that we think all construction workers should pack up their tools and seek a different line of work. There’s plenty of work that needs doing to mend our battered and broken environment; any parish or town council can draw up a list. It’s just not a priority for the London regime.
One reason for querying why we are putting up so many new buildings is that we seem to be very bad at looking after the buildings we already have. Our tax system is designed to encourage the replacement or alteration of perfectly serviceable buildings, even those that form part of our heritage. It has long been pointed out that it is absurd to charge VAT on housing repairs – the sustainable solution – but not on new housing. The EU-approved answer is to collect the tax and then give it back as a grant. It would be, wouldn’t it? With all the extra bureaucracy this entails, it’s a solution that could only have come from Brussels.
Today’s Western Daily Press highlights Chancellor George Osborne’s recent decision to remove VAT relief on approved alterations to listed buildings. Ministers have claimed the decision is all about stopping millionaires installing swimming pools tax-free. In fact, a sample of 12,049 recent applications revealed only 34 for pools, of which less than half had any chance of qualifying for the VAT relief. (And most folk whose homes are listed are anything but millionaires.) The Government has now decided to provide additional compensation to listed churches and other places of worship. But it still offers nothing to help other community buildings or buildings in private ownership.
Many projects are being put on hold, or cancelled, as owners worry about raising an additional 20%. Pensioners Alan and Carol Hudson’s home is the Grade II listed 14th century Horsey Manor Farm in Bridgwater. Not only does their home require continuous specialist maintenance and repair but plans to convert outbuildings at risk of dereliction have had to be abandoned because of what is now a £50,000 VAT bill. The couple were quoted as follows:
“As champions of heritage in an area where 20% of the regional income is from tourism, we feel betrayed by the nature and method of introduction of this tax. We are repeatedly struck by how often the Government’s decisions appear to show little recognition of the realities of life outside the privileged circles of the City and Parliament.”
EU rules leave little enough discretion as it is – which is why we need a Europe-wide revolution to reform fundamentally self-serving institutions that have failed. It’s still more objectionable when the UK Government makes a mess even of what discretion it does have.
One reason for querying why we are putting up so many new buildings is that we seem to be very bad at looking after the buildings we already have. Our tax system is designed to encourage the replacement or alteration of perfectly serviceable buildings, even those that form part of our heritage. It has long been pointed out that it is absurd to charge VAT on housing repairs – the sustainable solution – but not on new housing. The EU-approved answer is to collect the tax and then give it back as a grant. It would be, wouldn’t it? With all the extra bureaucracy this entails, it’s a solution that could only have come from Brussels.
Today’s Western Daily Press highlights Chancellor George Osborne’s recent decision to remove VAT relief on approved alterations to listed buildings. Ministers have claimed the decision is all about stopping millionaires installing swimming pools tax-free. In fact, a sample of 12,049 recent applications revealed only 34 for pools, of which less than half had any chance of qualifying for the VAT relief. (And most folk whose homes are listed are anything but millionaires.) The Government has now decided to provide additional compensation to listed churches and other places of worship. But it still offers nothing to help other community buildings or buildings in private ownership.
Many projects are being put on hold, or cancelled, as owners worry about raising an additional 20%. Pensioners Alan and Carol Hudson’s home is the Grade II listed 14th century Horsey Manor Farm in Bridgwater. Not only does their home require continuous specialist maintenance and repair but plans to convert outbuildings at risk of dereliction have had to be abandoned because of what is now a £50,000 VAT bill. The couple were quoted as follows:
“As champions of heritage in an area where 20% of the regional income is from tourism, we feel betrayed by the nature and method of introduction of this tax. We are repeatedly struck by how often the Government’s decisions appear to show little recognition of the realities of life outside the privileged circles of the City and Parliament.”
EU rules leave little enough discretion as it is – which is why we need a Europe-wide revolution to reform fundamentally self-serving institutions that have failed. It’s still more objectionable when the UK Government makes a mess even of what discretion it does have.
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Lord Bath at 80
Alexander George Thynne (he later dropped the ‘e’ from his surname) was born in London on 6th May 1932 but, as he put it, he “emigrated to Wessex within the next few weeks”. His mother was Cornish, a member of the Vivian family. His father was Henry Frederick Thynne, then styled Viscount Weymouth and later the 6th Marquess of Bath, the first of the showman aristocrats who opened their homes to the public after the Second World War. ‘We have seen the Lions of Longleat’, ran the car sticker. Inevitably, a spoof version was eventually to surface: ‘We have seen the Regionalists of Wessex’.
It was not until 1969 that Alexander first spoke of Wessex as a practical provincial definition (to use Thomas Hardy’s phrase), at a tourist board convention in Taunton. “I only reached the end of my speech with some difficulty,” he recalled. “There were some interruptions urging me to shut up, or to sit down.” By 1974, he had come to the conclusion that the only way to give clear expression to his regionalist ideas was to stand for Parliament, which he did, in the west Wiltshire seat of Westbury. And so Wessex Regionalism began.
Early in the next decade, there came a parting of ways. It might seem odd that someone who created a new political party because the others weren’t up to the job should then abandon it to enter the mainstream, but there are precedents. He explained his motives to The Regionalist in 1986 in the following terms:
“I felt that we had in fact publicised, and achieved, all that was within our reach within this particular phase of political evolution. There didn’t seem much point for me to be seen to be going over the same old ground, repeating myself, upon the political platform. Far better that I prepare myself for a time when I may have acquired an enhanced position to be useful to the devolutionary cause, with a seat perhaps, in the House of Lords: particularly if by that time there were to be an Alliance government in power.”
The majority view was that the Party should continue, a view that was progressively strengthened despite, or even because of, what was slung at it by the Westminster cartel (notably the tripling of the election deposit in 1985). There was, and is, no reason to allow ourselves to be relegated to an interesting footnote in some PhD thesis 200 years hence. While Alexander re-aligned himself with the Social Democrats and then the Liberal Democrats and awaited his seat in the Lords (which arrived in 1992 when he succeeded as 7th Marquess), others insisted that while there was energy to be devoted to the cause it should not go to waste.
Alexander’s tactical choice to exchange leadership of the Wessex Regionalists for the obscurity of the new centre ground appears not to have borne the fruit he may have imagined it doing. For all their federalist heritage, the Liberal Democrats today are in power nationally with a party dedicated to keeping regional devolution well off the agenda. It would be tempting to say ‘we told you so’ but it was far from apparent in 1981 that this would be the course of events.
What will be history’s judgement? We can today offer only the most provisional assessment. Lord Bath, probably, will take his place in a long line of Wessex mavericks from a comfortable background, from Edmund Burke to Tony Benn, but for the sharpest ‘compare and contrast’ we need look no further than Sir Richard Acland, 15th Baronet.
The Aclands of Killerton House, near Exeter, were for long major landowners in western Wessex, at their height presiding over 15,000 acres in Devon and 20,000 acres in Somerset, on the edge of Exmoor. Richard was the Liberal MP for Barnstaple from 1935 until, in 1942, he was instrumental in launching Common Wealth, a radical socialist party whose surviving members became a major influence on WR from 1980 onwards. ‘CW’ won three by-elections before being dealt a near-fatal blow by the swing to Labour in 1945. Richard, having failed to win a seat in the new Parliament, was among those who then jumped ship, later serving under Attlee as Second Church Estates Commissioner. He declined to take any long-term interest in the fate of the party he had founded.
As a socialist, Acland did find his inherited wealth an embarrassment and in 1944 he handed his estates to the National Trust. Lord Bath is relaxed about the idea that Longleat should belong to the community of Wessex, but it is not an idea he sees any need to advance unilaterally. The House of Thynne has no grand gesture to its name to set beside the House of Acland’s generous gift.
Our past President, John Banks, who knew both men, described Acland as the more intense and hard-working. Some of his views could even be classed as impatient and intolerant. Of Lord Bath, the worst caricature might describe him as a hedonist, self-obsessed, absorbed in creating and collecting art, commercially-aware, though not grasping, and showing no more than a passing interest in the civic responsibilities his ancestors took for granted. (His grandfather, the 5th Marquess, was Chairman of Wiltshire County Council continuously for 40 years.)
Alexander spent just eight years actively involved in the politics of Wessex Regionalism. Over 30 years have passed since. Anyone in his position must surely battle against suspicions of all kinds. Ours is a difficult age in which to be a political aristocrat, no matter how original and brilliant are the ideas put forth. For every sneer at the silver spoon there will be an equal and opposite accusation of class treason. For every accusation of leaving our Party to sink or swim by its own efforts, there would otherwise have been the accusation of creating a kept plaything. When our Party’s first constitution was drafted in 1980, it was suggested that the founder should automatically be a member of the Party Council, without needing to be voted on. The proposal sat ill with Alexander’s democratic ideals; he argued against it and did so successfully.
Wessex Regionalism is indeed an original and brilliant idea. It could not have been created except by someone with the leisure time, the mental freedom and flexibility, and the degree of independence from mainstream politics that are needed to think deeply about the key political problems of our time. It could not have been launched upon Wessex and the world without the public persona and panache that the Thynnes possess in abundance. Anyone who feels embarrassed by the roots of Wessex Regionalism should ask themselves how else it might have emerged in the era that it challenged.
This very straightforward idea was expressed not in a series of weighty tomes but in a slim pamphlet (A Regionalist Manifesto, 1975), occasional articles, and election addresses. In artistic terms, it amounted to a preliminary sketch, not a finished painting. That is its attraction for those drawn to it by its need for elaboration. In that sense, it is a profoundly democratic, collaborative, even trans-generational project. It has a beginning. But no end. And along the way, what advances the cause of Wessex is incorporated and what doesn’t is discarded. No-one since Thomas Hardy has done more to breathe life into the identity we so cherish, but Lord Bath’s most lasting legacy may be to have left so much undone. In the ancient wisdom of Lao Tzu, “I take no action and the people are transformed of themselves.”
It was not until 1969 that Alexander first spoke of Wessex as a practical provincial definition (to use Thomas Hardy’s phrase), at a tourist board convention in Taunton. “I only reached the end of my speech with some difficulty,” he recalled. “There were some interruptions urging me to shut up, or to sit down.” By 1974, he had come to the conclusion that the only way to give clear expression to his regionalist ideas was to stand for Parliament, which he did, in the west Wiltshire seat of Westbury. And so Wessex Regionalism began.
Early in the next decade, there came a parting of ways. It might seem odd that someone who created a new political party because the others weren’t up to the job should then abandon it to enter the mainstream, but there are precedents. He explained his motives to The Regionalist in 1986 in the following terms:
“I felt that we had in fact publicised, and achieved, all that was within our reach within this particular phase of political evolution. There didn’t seem much point for me to be seen to be going over the same old ground, repeating myself, upon the political platform. Far better that I prepare myself for a time when I may have acquired an enhanced position to be useful to the devolutionary cause, with a seat perhaps, in the House of Lords: particularly if by that time there were to be an Alliance government in power.”
The majority view was that the Party should continue, a view that was progressively strengthened despite, or even because of, what was slung at it by the Westminster cartel (notably the tripling of the election deposit in 1985). There was, and is, no reason to allow ourselves to be relegated to an interesting footnote in some PhD thesis 200 years hence. While Alexander re-aligned himself with the Social Democrats and then the Liberal Democrats and awaited his seat in the Lords (which arrived in 1992 when he succeeded as 7th Marquess), others insisted that while there was energy to be devoted to the cause it should not go to waste.
Alexander’s tactical choice to exchange leadership of the Wessex Regionalists for the obscurity of the new centre ground appears not to have borne the fruit he may have imagined it doing. For all their federalist heritage, the Liberal Democrats today are in power nationally with a party dedicated to keeping regional devolution well off the agenda. It would be tempting to say ‘we told you so’ but it was far from apparent in 1981 that this would be the course of events.
What will be history’s judgement? We can today offer only the most provisional assessment. Lord Bath, probably, will take his place in a long line of Wessex mavericks from a comfortable background, from Edmund Burke to Tony Benn, but for the sharpest ‘compare and contrast’ we need look no further than Sir Richard Acland, 15th Baronet.
The Aclands of Killerton House, near Exeter, were for long major landowners in western Wessex, at their height presiding over 15,000 acres in Devon and 20,000 acres in Somerset, on the edge of Exmoor. Richard was the Liberal MP for Barnstaple from 1935 until, in 1942, he was instrumental in launching Common Wealth, a radical socialist party whose surviving members became a major influence on WR from 1980 onwards. ‘CW’ won three by-elections before being dealt a near-fatal blow by the swing to Labour in 1945. Richard, having failed to win a seat in the new Parliament, was among those who then jumped ship, later serving under Attlee as Second Church Estates Commissioner. He declined to take any long-term interest in the fate of the party he had founded.
As a socialist, Acland did find his inherited wealth an embarrassment and in 1944 he handed his estates to the National Trust. Lord Bath is relaxed about the idea that Longleat should belong to the community of Wessex, but it is not an idea he sees any need to advance unilaterally. The House of Thynne has no grand gesture to its name to set beside the House of Acland’s generous gift.
Our past President, John Banks, who knew both men, described Acland as the more intense and hard-working. Some of his views could even be classed as impatient and intolerant. Of Lord Bath, the worst caricature might describe him as a hedonist, self-obsessed, absorbed in creating and collecting art, commercially-aware, though not grasping, and showing no more than a passing interest in the civic responsibilities his ancestors took for granted. (His grandfather, the 5th Marquess, was Chairman of Wiltshire County Council continuously for 40 years.)
Alexander spent just eight years actively involved in the politics of Wessex Regionalism. Over 30 years have passed since. Anyone in his position must surely battle against suspicions of all kinds. Ours is a difficult age in which to be a political aristocrat, no matter how original and brilliant are the ideas put forth. For every sneer at the silver spoon there will be an equal and opposite accusation of class treason. For every accusation of leaving our Party to sink or swim by its own efforts, there would otherwise have been the accusation of creating a kept plaything. When our Party’s first constitution was drafted in 1980, it was suggested that the founder should automatically be a member of the Party Council, without needing to be voted on. The proposal sat ill with Alexander’s democratic ideals; he argued against it and did so successfully.
Wessex Regionalism is indeed an original and brilliant idea. It could not have been created except by someone with the leisure time, the mental freedom and flexibility, and the degree of independence from mainstream politics that are needed to think deeply about the key political problems of our time. It could not have been launched upon Wessex and the world without the public persona and panache that the Thynnes possess in abundance. Anyone who feels embarrassed by the roots of Wessex Regionalism should ask themselves how else it might have emerged in the era that it challenged.
This very straightforward idea was expressed not in a series of weighty tomes but in a slim pamphlet (A Regionalist Manifesto, 1975), occasional articles, and election addresses. In artistic terms, it amounted to a preliminary sketch, not a finished painting. That is its attraction for those drawn to it by its need for elaboration. In that sense, it is a profoundly democratic, collaborative, even trans-generational project. It has a beginning. But no end. And along the way, what advances the cause of Wessex is incorporated and what doesn’t is discarded. No-one since Thomas Hardy has done more to breathe life into the identity we so cherish, but Lord Bath’s most lasting legacy may be to have left so much undone. In the ancient wisdom of Lao Tzu, “I take no action and the people are transformed of themselves.”
Monday, June 11, 2012
Banking on Stability
Stuckey is an important name in Wessex history. Douglas Stuckey, long the Chairman of Common Wealth, is a valued member of the WR Party Council. Outside politics, he is better known as the author of books and articles on Wessex history. Among these is Wessex Rising!, which charts the Monmouth Rebellion and the coming of William of Orange, the king in whose reign the Bank of England was established.
In the 19th century, Stuckeys’ was a household word across much of central Wessex. Stuckeys’ Bank, founded in about 1770 with its headquarters in Langport, was the second largest issuer of English banknotes after the Bank of England. Farmers offered one of the latter’s notes as payment were known to eye it disparagingly and then insist, “Gi’e oi Stuckeys’”. In 1796, because of the threat of French invasion, there was a run on the banks in Somerset. Except for Stuckeys’. The saying among the farmers was that they trusted Stuckeys’ Bank as much as their old sock for keeping their money in. While the Bank of England is popularly 'the Old Lady of Threadneedle Street', Stuckeys' Bank became 'the old lady from the west with a long stocking'. Stuckeys’ disappeared from the Wessex scene after 1909 when it merged with a Lancashire bank that eventually became part of NatWest (and so today is 83% State-owned via the RBS Group). The name survives only in the Bath Stuckeys branch of NatWest.
That was not the last attempt by Wessex to develop its own financial institutions. There was the Wessex Trustee Savings Bank, founded in 1930, merged away in 1975 and now part of the 41% State-owned Lloyds Banking Group.
Then there was the Bournemouth-based Wessex Building Society, launched in 1949, which merged in 1989 with London’s Portman Building Society to form the Portman Wessex. When this passed to the Regency & West of England Building Society the following year, the combined group adopted the Portman name. ‘Wessex’ had disappeared but the distribution of branches continued to be heavily concentrated in the far south of England and the head office continued to be located in Bournemouth. The Portman in turn merged with the Nationwide in 2007. And the Nationwide, as the name suggests, is anything but regional (though physically based in Swindon). It was a messy takeover that still rankles: members vote; they all get their windfalls; but there can be no second thoughts. What’s been done can never then be undone.
It’s a continuing struggle. Wessex doesn’t have the distinctive financial institutions of Scotland, with its own banknotes and historic names. Even Northumbria, with the Co-operative Bank, the Yorkshire Bank and many of the surviving building societies, can claim much more. We seem to be easy prey for London institutions, a place to send the back office functions while the decision-making is kept well out of our hands.
There is another way, still. In the wake of widespread disgust with the banks and building societies, credit unions are becoming a popular place to deposit savings and take out loans. Credit unions are self-limiting in that members must have some connection in common. This is usually a locality but it can be membership of an organisation. Plaid Cymru has a credit union for its members; perhaps we can look forward eventually to a Wessex Regionalist credit union? LETS schemes, and local currencies like the ‘Totnes Pound’, are easy to dismiss as a hippy gimmick but they surely also have their place in a more sustainable financial ecology.
We’d like to see more innovation from the centre too. Instead of the London regime being obsessed with preserving at any price the financial value of the zombie banks it owns, why not be bold and redefine them in terms of value to the customer? Break them up into regional banks. Mutualise or re-mutualise them. Tell the investment bankers to clear off, that they won’t be allowed to buy into them. Ever. We’re not holding our breath, because the regime has been backed into a corner where its interest as regulator and its interest as investor are diametrically opposed. One day, one of the two will have to give. The long-term public interest lies in destroying our money, not what passes for our democracy, because it’s far easier to replace. But who cares about the public interest?
What can we do? Look for opportunities locally (but in a joined-up, regional way). The antidote to the mass consumer society is the local producer society, meeting our own needs from our own resources. As the saying goes, if you want to see change, keep it in your pocket. Our money needs to go into our communities. We need to drain it from the banks and watch them die like fish out of water. It can be done. But it requires discipline and a firm ideological commitment to what will deliver sustainable long-term prosperity. We must never again give in to the blind temptations of short-term sell-out, as happened over and over again with banks, building societies, buses, trains, electricity and water. No-one must own Wessex but those who live here. No-one must benefit unfairly from using our land, our money, our politics, our society, or our lives. What it comes down to is that good business decisions have to consider the consequences for all those they affect. If our economic system as constituted can't or won't do that, then we need a new one.
That kind of thing doesn’t go down well. It gets called ‘financial terrorism’ and the like. And that’s not surprising. The stage is being set for the arrival of full-blown totalitarian liberalism. Maggie’s mate Pinochet did it with guns. Our current leaders will be doing it with laws. Greece and Italy already have their non-elected rulers in place. The idea is that freedom doesn’t mean doing what you like. It means living out your life in accordance with a rather crazy economics textbook. Individuals, governments, and even private businesses have all to abide by ‘the rules’. So bank customers must act ‘responsibly’ and not bring down the financial system in anger. Governments must submit to international laws of contract and not abrogate odious debts imposed upon their taxpayers under duress. We all have to take seriously the idea that banks create value in the form of financial ‘products’, which is a fancy name for fairy dust.
The clearest example of the new thinking came last month from Andrew Bailey, formerly Chief Cashier of the Bank of England and soon to be Deputy Chief Executive at the new bank regulator, the Prudential Regulation Authority. He proposes that free personal banking be banned on the grounds that it ‘distorts the market’. A market used to be the coming together of a willing buyer and a willing seller on mutually advantageous terms. Not any more. What buyer and seller think is now irrelevant. What matters is what the textbook says. And according to the textbook the purpose of markets is to ensure that wealth flows from the poorer to the richer by denying the former the means to say no.
Free personal banking doesn’t distort anything. Bailey’s excuses have been comprehensively trashed by the commentators. Banks make their profit out of charges for extras and, most of all, from lending our money out at interest, many times over (fractional reserve banking). The problem for banks is that interest rates are at an all-time low. They’re scared, because they’re not making enough money from our money. But the first to re-introduce bank charges will be the first to go bust as customers desert in droves. No-one dares do it. So the regulator steps up to ‘save the system’. Regulation, far from protecting us from the banks, therefore turns out to be the means of protecting the banks from us. Better check for space under that mattress now. And darn that old sock.
In the 19th century, Stuckeys’ was a household word across much of central Wessex. Stuckeys’ Bank, founded in about 1770 with its headquarters in Langport, was the second largest issuer of English banknotes after the Bank of England. Farmers offered one of the latter’s notes as payment were known to eye it disparagingly and then insist, “Gi’e oi Stuckeys’”. In 1796, because of the threat of French invasion, there was a run on the banks in Somerset. Except for Stuckeys’. The saying among the farmers was that they trusted Stuckeys’ Bank as much as their old sock for keeping their money in. While the Bank of England is popularly 'the Old Lady of Threadneedle Street', Stuckeys' Bank became 'the old lady from the west with a long stocking'. Stuckeys’ disappeared from the Wessex scene after 1909 when it merged with a Lancashire bank that eventually became part of NatWest (and so today is 83% State-owned via the RBS Group). The name survives only in the Bath Stuckeys branch of NatWest.
That was not the last attempt by Wessex to develop its own financial institutions. There was the Wessex Trustee Savings Bank, founded in 1930, merged away in 1975 and now part of the 41% State-owned Lloyds Banking Group.
Then there was the Bournemouth-based Wessex Building Society, launched in 1949, which merged in 1989 with London’s Portman Building Society to form the Portman Wessex. When this passed to the Regency & West of England Building Society the following year, the combined group adopted the Portman name. ‘Wessex’ had disappeared but the distribution of branches continued to be heavily concentrated in the far south of England and the head office continued to be located in Bournemouth. The Portman in turn merged with the Nationwide in 2007. And the Nationwide, as the name suggests, is anything but regional (though physically based in Swindon). It was a messy takeover that still rankles: members vote; they all get their windfalls; but there can be no second thoughts. What’s been done can never then be undone.
It’s a continuing struggle. Wessex doesn’t have the distinctive financial institutions of Scotland, with its own banknotes and historic names. Even Northumbria, with the Co-operative Bank, the Yorkshire Bank and many of the surviving building societies, can claim much more. We seem to be easy prey for London institutions, a place to send the back office functions while the decision-making is kept well out of our hands.
There is another way, still. In the wake of widespread disgust with the banks and building societies, credit unions are becoming a popular place to deposit savings and take out loans. Credit unions are self-limiting in that members must have some connection in common. This is usually a locality but it can be membership of an organisation. Plaid Cymru has a credit union for its members; perhaps we can look forward eventually to a Wessex Regionalist credit union? LETS schemes, and local currencies like the ‘Totnes Pound’, are easy to dismiss as a hippy gimmick but they surely also have their place in a more sustainable financial ecology.
We’d like to see more innovation from the centre too. Instead of the London regime being obsessed with preserving at any price the financial value of the zombie banks it owns, why not be bold and redefine them in terms of value to the customer? Break them up into regional banks. Mutualise or re-mutualise them. Tell the investment bankers to clear off, that they won’t be allowed to buy into them. Ever. We’re not holding our breath, because the regime has been backed into a corner where its interest as regulator and its interest as investor are diametrically opposed. One day, one of the two will have to give. The long-term public interest lies in destroying our money, not what passes for our democracy, because it’s far easier to replace. But who cares about the public interest?
What can we do? Look for opportunities locally (but in a joined-up, regional way). The antidote to the mass consumer society is the local producer society, meeting our own needs from our own resources. As the saying goes, if you want to see change, keep it in your pocket. Our money needs to go into our communities. We need to drain it from the banks and watch them die like fish out of water. It can be done. But it requires discipline and a firm ideological commitment to what will deliver sustainable long-term prosperity. We must never again give in to the blind temptations of short-term sell-out, as happened over and over again with banks, building societies, buses, trains, electricity and water. No-one must own Wessex but those who live here. No-one must benefit unfairly from using our land, our money, our politics, our society, or our lives. What it comes down to is that good business decisions have to consider the consequences for all those they affect. If our economic system as constituted can't or won't do that, then we need a new one.
That kind of thing doesn’t go down well. It gets called ‘financial terrorism’ and the like. And that’s not surprising. The stage is being set for the arrival of full-blown totalitarian liberalism. Maggie’s mate Pinochet did it with guns. Our current leaders will be doing it with laws. Greece and Italy already have their non-elected rulers in place. The idea is that freedom doesn’t mean doing what you like. It means living out your life in accordance with a rather crazy economics textbook. Individuals, governments, and even private businesses have all to abide by ‘the rules’. So bank customers must act ‘responsibly’ and not bring down the financial system in anger. Governments must submit to international laws of contract and not abrogate odious debts imposed upon their taxpayers under duress. We all have to take seriously the idea that banks create value in the form of financial ‘products’, which is a fancy name for fairy dust.
The clearest example of the new thinking came last month from Andrew Bailey, formerly Chief Cashier of the Bank of England and soon to be Deputy Chief Executive at the new bank regulator, the Prudential Regulation Authority. He proposes that free personal banking be banned on the grounds that it ‘distorts the market’. A market used to be the coming together of a willing buyer and a willing seller on mutually advantageous terms. Not any more. What buyer and seller think is now irrelevant. What matters is what the textbook says. And according to the textbook the purpose of markets is to ensure that wealth flows from the poorer to the richer by denying the former the means to say no.
Free personal banking doesn’t distort anything. Bailey’s excuses have been comprehensively trashed by the commentators. Banks make their profit out of charges for extras and, most of all, from lending our money out at interest, many times over (fractional reserve banking). The problem for banks is that interest rates are at an all-time low. They’re scared, because they’re not making enough money from our money. But the first to re-introduce bank charges will be the first to go bust as customers desert in droves. No-one dares do it. So the regulator steps up to ‘save the system’. Regulation, far from protecting us from the banks, therefore turns out to be the means of protecting the banks from us. Better check for space under that mattress now. And darn that old sock.
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