The choice of at least one Christmas present has become easier for many. The release of Adele's first album for six years - '30' - has been impossible to avoid, with the number 30 appearing on the wall of Edinburgh Castle, the Louvre and the Empire State Building as well as a British Vogue cover story, an ITV Audience with Adele and a Meghan style confessional with Oprah Winfrey.
The national treasure’s voice is undiminished as is her ability to charm and move with songs created from her emotional struggles with divorce, motherhood and loneliness.
Her drawing power has successfully persuaded Spotify to to hide the shuffle option on album pages so that the 170 million subscribers must listen to the tracks in the order devised by the artist. The album tells a story which and ‘should be listened to as we intended’.
This is something of a return to LPs and cassettes where selection of individual tracks was a challenge, and is reminiscent of The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper which must end with A Day in the Life.
The vast government spending during the pandemic on the NHS, the furlough scheme and test and trace have put immense strain on the economy, but millions of livelihoods have been protected. That projects such as HS2, albeit in limited form, are still proceeding is a sign that ambition and optimism prevail in the UK. This may be connected with how attractive the country is as a trading partner.
It is noted that the number of Chinese billionaires streaming into BritaIn has increased to 650 in the past year showing that London is the destination of choice for Asia’s wealthiest. A report by Boodle Hatfield found that the top reasons for this were London’s reputation as Europe’s leading hub for innovation and technology start-ups; also our stable political environment, respect for the rule of law and a track record of ‘protecting investors from state seizures of assets’.
It is estimated that Chinese investments in Britain have an accumulated value of £135 billion.
Having immense wealth can be still a problem if like MacKenzie Scott you want to give it away. The former wife of Jeff Bezos has vowed to donate her £45billion to good causes. In the last 12 months she has given away £8.6billion to 786 organisations. The problem is that the rising value of her 4% share in Amazon is adding to her net worth faster than she is able to give it away.
She and Bill Gates may be influenced by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie who pronounced that “He who dies rich, dies disgraced”. I wish MacKenzie well in avoiding an ignominious end.
It will be Christmas behind bars for at least nine Insulate Britain protesters. Lady Justice Sharp told them: “In a society which recognises the right to freedom of peaceful assembly, protests causing some degree of inconvenience are to be expected and up to a point, tolerated”.
The words ‘up to a point’ are important. The point was passed some time ago, when activists glueing themselves to the M25 prevented people getting to work, taking their children to school or ambulances conveying the sick to hospital. One protestor stated ‘In a democracy steeped in lies and corruption, good people have a duty to disobey bad laws’.
The protest group’s most melodramatic and hyperbolic announcement suggested that failure to support it would make you ‘complicit in genocide’.
Such catastrophist rhetoric infects views on the pandemic, racism and almost everything the government and politicians do, or don’t do. There are certainly problems but the dynamics of the media and particularly social media inflame rather than explain. Who ever went viral by starting a sentence with ‘On the one hand’ or ‘Actually it’s a bit more complicated’?
There is a worrying tendency to polarise and denounce; to describe crimes and catastrophes rather that errors and problems. The more people convince themselves to believe in the worst outcome, the more likely they are to make it happen.
It was reassuring that the return to reasonably normal life enabled the holding of remembrance events this year, after having been cancelled last year. I was pleased to be at memorials in North Tyneside and at Trinity House in Newcastle. It is essential that these occasions continue in order to honour the sacrifice made by so many. Congratulations to the excellent veterans’ organisation Forward Assist on being awarded a QAVS – Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service (well done Tony and Paula)- and to my friend John Thompson Snr (the Paterfamilias of Thompson’s of Prudhoe) on receiving his MBE at Windsor Castle. What next? The Freedom of Prudhoe?
What great news that the HMRC is to set up a new base in Newcastle City Centre. The new development – the largest letting ever in the city – will have 9000 employees in the nine-storey block in Pilgrim’s Quarter on the former Odeon cinema site. Have they asked about the car parking? Make sure you all avoid the Black Friday season scams and remember the same goods are likely to be available cheaper before the break. Happy Christmas to you all!
