Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

Cameron will pay a price for allowing Euro sceptic ministers to vote against him if and when he calls the referendum to endorse whatever deal he strikes with the EU. It is one thing for Corbyn in opposition to allow dissent in the shadow cabinet, but it is quite another for the prime minister to put up with disunity in the real one. People expect the government to lead; that is what they pay for. One which cannot make up its mind on an issue as profound as whether to walk out of the EU will never recover its authority. Labour never regained its composure after Wilson let the cabinet go its own way at the last referendum. Cameron will have the same problem. He can only avoid it by reshuffling his cabinet after he gets whatever deal he can and before he calls the referendum. It is imperative that he goes to the country with his government behind him. All of them.

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Rudolf Hess, Hitler’s deputy and right hand man, flew to Scotland on a mysterious peace mission in 1941, which has never been convincingly explained, to meet unidentified politicians who wanted to end the war. The truth has been covered up for generations because to reveal it would somehow undermine the honour and constitutional fabric of the United Kingdom. Who was plotting against Churchill? What were the peace terms on offer? What happened to Hess? Was he killed in the War? Was the prisoner in Spandau a double?
There are many questions to which in the modern day one man, Saul Benedict has all the answers, because his parents were players in the drama involving Churchill, Hitler, leading politicians and an important Royal. Saul is an author and declares his intention to write a book to reveal all, but he is shot dead, apparently accidentally by a poacher. But was it an accident? Rick Coleman an investigative journalist determines to find out and in doing so to uncover the mystery.
Taking place in the modern day but with flashback chapters which gradually unfold the hidden secrets, the novel is a fast moving and compelling read based on the family knowledge of the author whose parents had connections to both Hess and Hitler and to British Intelligence.  

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There were lurid prophesies about a revenge reshuffle which were clearly exaggerated and, as is his style, the Labour leader took his time sounding out and deciding.  In the end the changes were a refinement of the previous line up, not a root and branch reconstruction. The Tories had their usual laugh and loads of hostile briefings were put about by anti-Corbyn Labour MPs. One of the arguments was that because Corbyn was himself a serial rebel, he must tolerate rebellion in his team. That argument is plain silly.

Corbyn was indeed a serial rebel over three decades, but from the back benches. He was never in the shadow cabinet. He was a rebel, but now he is the Leader with a huge mandate and swelling membership, he is the main stream. Those who are opposed to his policies are the rebels and can rebel all they like, but , like the Leader they love to hate, from the back benches. A few, having had a bit of a telling off, remain in the shadow cabinet for now, but if they go on briefing and muttering against the party’s choice of leader, not for long. Post May elections at the latest.

One of the reasons Benn survived was the fact, now plain, that the bomb Syria vote was militarily pointless. There have been fewer than a handful of RAF sorties, with little practical effect and far short of the military impact those emotional Commons speeches wound everybody up to expect. So Benn gained acclamation opposing his leader and supporting the government at the price of an error of judgement. For an opposition politician that is not, in the long run, good.