IT'S ALMOST THE DEADLINE [539]

The General Strike of 4th to 12th May 1926 was called by the Trade Union Congress (TUC) in sympathy with British coal miners, whose wages and working conditions had eroded and declined in the years after the First World War. The first day saw an estimated 1.5-1.75 million workers on strike, the TUC had restricted participation to key industries: iron and steel, transport, shipping ports, and printing.

However, as “The Times” reported in its edition of 5th May, “The printing industry is at a standstill, but lithographers have not been withdrawn, and compositors in London have not received instructions to strike.”

I have owned a copy of this issue of “The Times” for years, but never properly scrutinised its bizarre appearance. It is a single sheet of foolscap-sized paper (32 x 20 cm) – I have since discovered this edition is known as “Little Sister”, in comparison with the “Big Brother” of the regular broadsheet – printed on both sides in dense typewriter text, the only picture being King’s coat of arms in the paper’s masthead. 

I had seen similar examples of other newspapers printed during the strike in similarly reduced circumstances – there exists rudimentary editions of the “Daily Mirror”, “Daily Mail” and “The Daily Telegraph” – but with “The Times” being Britain’s (unofficial) newspaper of record, with an unbroken print run since 1785, this was the one to have. My copy now resides in a mylar bag, to prevent decomposition of the fragile newsprint paper, a relic of a moment in time.

As “The Times” recently discussed [link], its 5th May 1926 edition was produced and distributed by volunteers and helpers corralled by John Jacob Astor, the then owner of the paper, having already been made aware at a meeting, of newspaper proprietors with the British Government, that its intention was to publish an official Government newspaper to provide both official news and the Government’s viewpoint during the strike, either as a collective effort with the industry, or by itself. This became “The British Gazette”, published by His Majesty’s Stationery Office from the requisitioned premises of “The Morning Post”, using staff from that paper and the “Daily Express”, and edited by the former journalist and current Chancellor of the Exchequer, Winston Churchill.

With printing presses unavailable, six “Multigraph” machines were used to print my copy of “The Times”. These table-top devices, more used by offices for printing direct mail and forms, these involved sliding individual letters, spaces and punctuation onto a cylinder, with motorised versions printed six to seven thousand copies an hour. Haste and inexperience with loading sentences backwards explain many spelling errors, most notably the “WEATHER ORECAST” at the top of the front page, but these were apparently fixed for a second edition the same day, so I now know my copy was from the first edition.

The following days’ editions of “The Times” looked more like the regular paper, printed on its regular presses by an amateur team only just shown how to operate the equipment, but with its page count reduced to one broadsheet folded into four pages. This was partly a result of Churchill requesting newsprint stock for printing “The British Gazette” – originally requesting access to their entire stock for an explicitly Government mouthpiece, “The Times” would only relinquish a quarter of it.

In media terms, the legacy of the General Strike is usually the granting of a Royal Charter to the then-private British Broadcasting Company, having maintained its independent and impartial radio broadcasting during the strike in the face of a threat from Churchill to requisition it for Government use in a manner similar to “The British Gazette”, which still published programme listings for BBC stations like it was a regular paper. The “Little Sister” edition of “The Times” is a further reminder that the UK only ever had state media once, a hundred years ago, for less than two weeks.

The 1926 General Strike ended without agreement, with miners continuing to strike for a further few months. Much later, an industrial dispute over modernising work practices at “The Times” and “The Sunday Times” led to Thomson Newspapers, which bought them from the Astor family in 1966, to suspend production of the papers for nearly a year from December 1978, breaking a near two hundred year print run.

I NEVER LIED TO YOU, I’VE ALWAYS BEEN COOL [196]

It is Friday 6^th September, and Sky News is handed a leaked Government memo. Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister since Wednesday 24^th July, is “proroguing” Parliament (discontinuing the session without dissolving it) for five weeks, and is seen as a move to disrupt efforts to ensure the United Kingdom leaves the European Union with a deal on trade and other matters. 

The memo, in Johnson’s handwriting, had been presented the day before, in redacted form, during a court case aimed at stopping the prorogation, and stated that, “the whole September session is a rigmarole [REDATCTED] to show the public that MPs were earning that crust.” 

Just as Donald Trump had been defending the use of a Sharpie pen to draw around the state of Alabama on a map indicating the path of a hurricane, indicating it had been forecast to hit it, but won’t anymore – breathe in, breath out – the redaction was to hide something embarrassing, rather than sensitive: “girly swot Cameron,” referring to the Prime Minister before the last one. David Cameron, Boris Johnson, and Johnson’s brother Jo, all attended Oxford University, and because Boris Johnson “only” achieved a 2:1, while the other two have firsts, they are “girly swots,” a remark made in 2013, while Johnson was mayor of London.

Two days earlier, on Wednesday 4^th September, Johnson shouted across the floor of the House of Commons, at Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Opposition, “call an election, you great big girl’s blouse.” Corbyn was among those calling for one previously, as one way of resolving the deadlock in Parliament over Brexit, but when it became clear that Johnson could call one for after the current Friday 31^st October date for exiting the EU, the withdrawal of that support became a further way to frustrate the Prime Minister...

...not that Boris Johnson couldn’t do that by himself. On Tuesday 3^rd September, the first day Johnson spoke in Parliament as Prime Minister, twenty-one Conservative MPs were effectively kicked out of the party for voting against the Government for a bill aimed at preventing the UK leaving the EU without a deal - these included Sir Nicholas Soames, Winston Churchill’s grandson, and former Chancellors of the Exchequer Philip Hammond and Kenneth Clarke. Earlier the same day, another Tory MP, Phillip Lee, walked across the Commons floor to join another party, wiping out the Government’s one-seat majority before the vote even happened. On Thursday 5^thSeptember, the aforementioned Jo Johnson, also an MP, resigned from the Cabinet, writing on Twitter that, “in recent weeks I’ve been torn between family loyalty and the national interest – it’s an unresolvable tension and time for others to take on my roles as MP & minister.” On Saturday 7^th September, the Work and Pensions Secretary resigns as both a Cabinet member and a Conservative - Amber Rudd described what happened to her colleagues as an act of political vandalism.

Along with other defenestrated MPs like Justine Greening, Dominic Grieve and Rory Stewart, Johnson had effectively removed the more moderate voices from his Parliamentary party, pushing the Conservatives further to the right. Perhaps it will render Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party obsolete, but it could make the Conservatives obsolete before then – on Thursday 5^thSeptember, Johnson made a speech stating he would “rather be dead in a ditch” than delay Brexit, leading to questions about why officers from West Yorkshire Police were being used as a backdrop, especially when one stood behind the Prime Minister needed to sit down.

As a girly swot, a big girl’s blouse, and someone politically slightly left of centre, who doesn’t consider themselves a Leaver or Remainer because they didn’t want the entire poorly-executed mess of Brexit in the first place, mainly because it served to answer existential questions within the Conservative Party rather than in the wider United Kingdom, this last week has been especially hard. I can’t be as laid back as Jacob Rees-Mogg about it – in the moment that picture was captured of him slouching across the Commons front bench, he looked like he was waiting to be painted, but only as a fool. The only reason I have felt the need to recount the last week is to make it clear to myself that it happened. Future school children will be taught Brexit in history class, by which time more sense will have been made about what happened, due to the one thing I currently cannot have: hindsight.

The last week in British politics will ultimately prove that Boris Johnson’s most satisfying performance will have been as a guest presenter of “Have I Got News for You” – he was nominated for a BAFTA for Best Entertainment Performance in 2004, alongside Stephen Fry and Paul Merton, ultimately losing out to Jonathan Ross.

JUMP INTO A DUSTBIN AND DANCE [87]

After another year blighted by terrorism and ideology – OK, name a year when that wasn’t the case – Christmas becomes a time for remembering the lights in our world, those things for which we give thanks, for which the world becomes that bit better or, in the very least, a little more bearable.

This was demonstrated by my finding a radio show, recently played out on BBC Radio 4 Extra, titled “The Naughty Navy Show,” from 1965, starring Spike Milligan, with John Bird and Barry Humphries, in a story not unlike those found in “The Goon Show,” but without the orchestra and sound effects. The difference here was how the show was recorded in front of a group of students at Greenwich Royal Naval College, on Christmas Day. While not the best show Milligan ever did, it is nice to hear everyone giving up their time on Christmas Day to perform a professional show. Similar shows were done for Army and Royal Mail workers, but at other times of year.

For me, Spike Milligan is the father of modern comedy. Milligan begat “The Goon Show,” which inspired “I’m Sorry I’ll Read That Again,” which inspired “Monty Python’s Flying Circus,” which inspired a number of comedy specials on Canadian television, which led its producer, Lorne Michaels, to create “Saturday Night Live,” which produced or inspired every American comedy film, so-called or actually funny, ever since. Milligan is also the father of subversive comedy – “The Goon Show” featured impressions and parodies of the Prime Minister, then Winston Churchill, at a time when that was just not done, and numerous satires of British institutions, both military and civilian, filled the show every week. The sheer effort to write twenty-six half hours per week cost Milligan his sanity at times, making him one of the first to talk openly about depression, for which the national conversation is still playing catch-up.

Just as I had been introduced to “The Goon Show” by my father, I was introduced to Spike Milligan through his poetry, particularly “In the Ning Nang Nong,” by one of my primary school teachers, Mrs Mason. We would learn double, or joined-up, writing by copying out Milligan’s poems: “Pussy-cat / What are vices? / Catching rats / And eating mices!” That practice has given way to something faster and clearer for me to write, but my expectations for poetry to be both symbolic and economic were set by copying up some of the best examples until it stayed in your head: “There are holes in the sky / Where the rain gets in / But they’re ever so small / That’s why the rain is thin.”

Milligan also has a sense of bravery in light of those who defend their nationality as part of their identity, for he was willing to lose his own when it became indefensible - as a British Indian, born in Ahmednagar, he refused to take the Oath of Allegiance necessary for him to get a British passport, and was rendered stateless, until he gained an Irish passport – even marrying a British woman later, and a subsequent letter writing campaign to the Foreign Office, made no difference.

I know I am likely to return to the man and his work again, for how it has helped shape my view of the world since childhood, and I will continue to be thankful for knowing how much of a difference his work will continue to make.

GET HIGH, GET TALL, YEAH WE’RE LIGHTER THAN AIR [22]

I am not really qualified to talk about alcoholic drinks, as I only drink them every so often, and usually just to get the point of what the drink maker was intending – a half-pint of Guinness, a Pimm’s and Lemonade, and that’s about it. I certainly don’t understand the desire of some to get intentionally drunk, let alone those who think thrusting a condition of being less inhibited upon yourself makes you more able to be creative – one drink usually leaves me prepared for a good night’s sleep.

However, I can still talk about the history of Special Brew, both venerated and berated as the stereotypical British “tramp fuel,” without drinking it. It is a strong pilsner beer, usually found only in cans, and was first brewed in tribute to Sir Winston Churchill – appropriately enough, a new Five Pound note will survive being dunked in a can of Special Brew, and presumably also a glass of it, but the image of the drink in the UK means Special Brew is not often pictured as being drunk from a glass.

The Churchill connection comes from a visit he made to Copenhagen in 1950 while in between stints as Prime Minister, which Carlsberg commemorated with a special drink that was infused with the flavour of cognac, to match his taste for brandy. He would later name it “Commemoration Lager,” when Carlsberg delivered two crates to him later, but it became “Special Brew” on when it went on general sale – it was originally “Easter Brew” in its native Denmark, but that name is now on another, weaker beer.

Despite the pedigree the drink hoped to create, the social impact of alcohol as a whole led Carlsberg, in 2015, to make it weaker, or less efficient in getting you drunk. Any drink over 7.5% ABV is taxed more highly in the UK, and Special Brew, at 9%, was made to fit. To fit a pledge to provide no more than four units of alcohol in one can, signed between beer companies and the UK government, the original 500 ml can was reduced to 440 ml – so, so long as you have one, it is now fine. (At the other end of the scale, drinks under 2.8% have less duty applied to it, as anyone that insisted on choosing “Guinness Mid-Strength” will know – there is no “Low-Strength”, so where’s the “Mid”?)

I am sure Special Brew tastes fine for those choosing to drink it, and its poor image in the UK is balanced by more than two thirds of sales apparently being made to “older professionals in management positions,” but its image could be overturned by selling it in large, ornate bottles, with one of those old-fashioned stoppers attached to it, and it was marketed like a craft beer. If it is to be thought of as highly as Churchill, Special Brew shouldn’t be sold in a can.