We’ll Meet Again
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So, 400,000 gowns for the NHS that were delivered to the UK in a blaze of publicity appear to be useless.
What was actually bought by the government then was time to cover up their public statements confirming the purchase, when in fact accounts (even in the Daily Telegraph) suggest that no deal had been finalised. What was bought by the government were fantastical TV reports of flagship aircraft from RAF Brize Norton making a trip to a supplier outside the EU to pick up tons of items, many of which could not be used. This, is case you don’t recognise it, is propaganda.
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Propaganda is defined as - information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a political cause or point of view.
The most disturbing aspect of all this is the supinity of the British public when confronted by these biased and misleading reports. Most of it I’m sure, is related to a mindset that says; ‘we voted for it, therefore it can’t be wrong’. At the precise time when we need a government that is ruthlessly fixed on the detail, ruthlessly lead by proper scientific advice and ruthlessly dedicated to protecting the health of the people and those whose job it is to care for the people, we have a government that is way off the mark.
The use of propaganda is to my mind, the last resort of fools, charlatans and worse, dictatorships and is very much the politics of last resort. We now see this regularly in the pronouncements of our Conservative Government. What has bought us to such a state as this?
The ‘simple’ count of the dead from Covid - 19 has just yesterday passed 30,000. This is the government’s ‘official’ figure. Accepting this at face value, we have just surpassed the number killed in the ‘blitz’ in London during World War Two. The total number of those killed by enemy bombs in 1939 – 45 is reckoned to be around the 32,000 mark. It won’t be long before this figure is also passed. It is of course quite possible that the government were up to similar tricks during WW2.
The true facts and statistics of the death count may never be released, here or in any other countries come to that. Covid – 19 is an awful, awful thing but the temptation for governments to claim success and downplay difficulties is seemingly immense. The Office for National Statistics has death records going back years. Simply taking the deaths in 2020 that are above average for the UK, it’s not difficult to arrive at a figure of 50,000 above the average. All these deaths will not be accompanied by a ‘Covid -19’ cause of death on the certificate and so are not included in the national statistics put out by the government. But all these ‘above average’ deaths must, in all but a few cases be directly, or indirectly related to the virus and the pandemic we are now experiencing. This analysis had been published in both the Financial Times (22 April 2020) and The Times (6 May 2020).
Unfortunately, the same strand of propaganda runs through the testing figure claims by the government for the UK. Government claims of 100,000 daily tests at the end of April seemed to have been based on tests sent out, not tests completed and the numbers in early May are now falling again. Maybe even the government themselves, are wondering if there is any limit to what they can get away with in the present crisis. Challenging the handling of the crisis can be met quite easily with charging the perpetrators of not being good citizens and not supporting the national effort when we should all be standing together. It’s a record that has been played before. We had to ‘meet it again’ it seems.
My father, a WW2 veteran, told me that ‘the first casualty of war is the truth’. This is a well known saying although there’s some debate over who actually coined it. Maybe we shouldn’t be so surprised that this is now being expertly demonstrated nightly on our TV screens.
Our Prime Minister will appear on those same screens this coming Sunday, desperate to give us some small bone of lockdown consolation to chew. If one is produced, examine it carefully, be circumspect with your celebration - this war is not yet over.
Tomorrow we will be marking 75 years since VE day, possibly with a stay at home celebratory street party. My father and mother were never very keen on this celebration. In May 1945, my father was in the Far East preparing with fellow troops in the Parachute Regiment to be dropped onto the Japanese mainland. They didn’t celebrate until VJ day; 15 August 1945.
To bring that war to an end took a momentous event. To bring this one to an end will require similar. Do not celebrate too soon. Keep Safe.
Keith Murphy, 7 May 2020
