Boris the Fridge-Hider

In honour of our Prime Minister's latest exploit (avoiding the press by shutting himself in a fridge) I've composed a little song, sung to a well-known tune by The Who. Do feel free to share and sing along...

Look who's scurrying across the floor
Blond and hairy, has no balls
In the polls he was ahead
Now he's hanging by a thread

Boris the fridge-hider
Boris the fridge-hider

He can tell nothing but lies
Has no issue with Russian bribes
Reporters cause him indigestion
(They might ask him some hard questions)

Boris the fridge-hider
Boris the fridge-hider

Creepy Tory, Creepy Tory,
Creepy Creepy Tory Tory Creepy Creepy Tory Tory
Creepy Creepy Tory Tory Creepy Creepy Tory Tory

Screws anything that's in a skirt
(And anyone who trusts his word)
Bellowing: "Get Brexit Done!"
Then hides away 'mid the gammon

Boris the fridge-hider
Boris the fridge-hider

But tomorrow is Election Day
So give a Christmas gift to the whole UK
Kick him out of Number 10
And bring the Tories' reign to a sticky end

Boris the fridge-hider
Boris the fridge-hider

SHARE AND SING ALONG!

Nice Things of the Week! 17th June 2017 (Part One): Jeremy Corbyn

The election in a nutshell.

Welp, the blog's been a tad quiet for a while, I know. I've struggled a bit with workload over the past couple of months, what with the new job and all, which slowed down the rewrites on Wolf's Hill markedly, to say nothing of trying to lay the groundwork for The Next Novel. Which part of this caused my old friend the Black Dog to resurface, I don't know, but it did. The past few weeks have been particularly tough, but (touch wood) I think I've turned a corner now. I hope so.

Good things have been in evidence over recent weeks. We had a snap general election here in the UK, in which it was widely predicted that the ruling Evil Bastard Conservative Party would wipe the floor with the left-wing Labour Party - even by Labour Party supporters. I have to admit I was afraid they were right: in terms of policies and vision I'd always felt Jeremy Corbyn was the best thing Labour had had for ages, but it was looking increasingly as though he was incapable of actually leading the party. When the election cycle started, the Spawn of Satan Conservatives were 22 points ahead of Labour. Not just defeat, but annihilation was prophesied.

And yet... over the six weeks leading up to the election, Corbyn showed what he was made of, supported by thousands of dedicated party activists like Matt Dent (to name but one.) The poll gap closed over the weeks, leading to a final result of a hung parliament. It isn't a Labour victory, but considering where things were, it's extraordinary. With Brexit, Trump and so much else it was easy to give in and decide everything was fucked. The French election, when the far-right Marine Le Pen was soundly defeated, was the first indication things weren't necessarily in an irreversible slide. This was the second. It really feels as though not only the Loathsome Shower of  C Tories' Government, but the hateful and divisive politics that's been the dominant discourse in Britain for so long, is crumbling. Well, a boy can dream.

Not that there hasn't been horrific shit as well, such as the terrorist attacks in my home city, Manchester, and in London, plus the horrific fire at Grenfell Tower. But even there, we saw what people can be like at their best - stepping up to the plate to help those caught up in the destruction. We were reminded that there is still good.

Maybe even some cause for hope.

Priceless

TV licence: a hundred and something quid a year.
TV: Easily obtainable from a charity shop.
Radio: Even easier and cheaper to obtain.
Hearing the Culture Secretary called 'Jeremy C*nt' on national radio to a breakfast audience of millions: Priceless.
There are some things money can't buy. For everything else, there's the BBC.

Armistice Day

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye,
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
-Siegfried Sassoon.

Drop Everything. Read This. Seriously.

Something that my friend Joel posted this morning on the Ramsey Campbell messageboard as part of a discussion. It's something that deserves being very widely read, before it's too late.

Let's put a few current facts together and see what they suggest in combination.

1. The Government has announced that a million public sector jobs are to be axed.
2. The Government has also announced that a high proportion of people on disability benefit will be reclassified as unemployed, quite regardless of their chances of finding work.
3. Now the Government has announced that people who have been unemployed for a long time will be... not trained, not helped to find work, not given even temporary jobs, but rather forced to do unpaid work that corresponds to the most basic of public sector manual jobs.
4. The DSS estimates the annual cost of benefit fraud to be £1.1 billion. The Inland Revenue estimates the annual cost of tax evasion to be £40 billion.
5. The Government is cutting back staffing levels heavily in the DSS and the Inland Revenue, showing that neither helping people find work nor catching tax evaders is a priority. Catching benefit fraudsters is, however, such a priority that David Cameron has announced that private sector bounty hunters will be hired to track them down.
6. The Chief Executive of the Tory-controlled Birmingham City Council has notified 26,000 employees that they may or may not be made redundant – but their current contracts are null and void, and they will not even be considered for re-engagement unless they sign new contracts that radically diminish their terms and conditions – effectively casualising the Council workforce.
7. Kenneth Clarke, current Justice Secretary and onetime Home Secretary, famously commented that a very high level of unemployment was "a price worth paying" to break the trade unions.

What these facts show in combination is a minority Conservative Government, propped up by LibDem quislings, trying to do as much damage to our public services, the people who provide them and the people who receive them as possible. This is open war on the rights and living standards of the non-rich. It will greatly increase the crime rate, the suicide rate and the mortality rate among the non-rich. It will create a gangster economy of vicious profiteering, with every area of the public sector – most especially healthcare – being carved up into franchises.

The Government has said that the NHS budget is "ring-fenced". However, it will have to be spread much thinner to cover the community healthcare being cut out of the social services budget. Over the next few years there will be a wholesale shift from the NHS budget being used mostly to train and pay NHS staff to the same budget being used mostly to pay private sector health providers... who, as New Labour's Independent Sector Treatment Programme proved, are a lot more expensive than their NHS counterparts. They are also a lot less accountable, because they refuse to disclose their clinical and financial performance data on the grounds that it is "commercially sensitive".

The question is not when the ConDem Government will stop destroying everything that is decent about our society. The question is whether anyone will stop them. It has to happen soon. By the time of the next general election, the damage done to our social fabric and to millions of lives will be irreversible.

This is war.

New Model Army

Never Again was launched at the Fantasycon on Saturday 18th September, and I'm glad to say it went very well. Plenty of copies shifted, and plenty of good publicity for this anthology, which deserves to sell widely and well- both for its content, and for its cause.

The Quietus picked the anthology as its Book of the Day on October 1st. Joel and Ally are hoping to get Amnesty International to make it available in their online shop. But the proudest moment of all...

I make no bones about it: New Model Army are, quite simply, my favourite band in the world. Their blend of musical excellence, powerful lyrics, politics, emotional commitment and love of nature (among many other traits) has meant a hell of a lot to me over the years, ever since some saintly soul first played the Thunder And Consolation album to me. They're the best- a great band with guts and integrity who've ploughed their own furrow and gone their own way over a career spanning thirty years and whose latest album, Today Is A Good Day, is as good as anything they've ever done.

New Model Army have listed Never Again on their website, here.

This is- purely personally- a very proud moment.

So if you get the chance to buy this anthology, it is well worth buying. And if New Model Army are playing your town, it's worth going to see them, especially if you've never seen it. I think you owe it to yourself.

Never Again

I've been accepted for a few anthologies this year, but none I'm prouder to be included in than this:

Never Again is an attempt to voice the collective revulsion of writers in the weird fiction genre against political attitudes that stifle compassion and deny our collective human inheritance. The imagination is crucial to an understanding both of human diversity and of common ground. Weird fiction is often stigmatised as a reactionary and ignorant genre - we know better. The anthology will be published by Gray Friar Press in September 2010, and edited by Allyson Bird and Joel Lane.

It will be a mixture of original stories and reprints from Ramsey Campbell, Lisa Tuttle and Joe R. Lansdale amongst others. Never Again is a non-profit initiative aimed at promoting awareness of these issues among readers and writers of weird fiction. The editors, authors/artist and publisher will receive no fees for this work. Any profits made from sales will be donated to anti-racist or human rights organizations, e.g. The Sophie Lancaster Foundation.

The Sophie Lancaster case was one of the most revolting crimes I've ever encountered, and there are few things that fill me with greater loathing than fascism or racism. Or homophobia, for that matter. Prejudice and hatred based on ethnicity or sexuality is contemptible and pathetic. The political organisations that attempt to exploit those impulses and gain power from them- such as the BNP under the repulsive bigot Nick Griffin- are the vilest of the vile and must be defeated.

I'm delighted to announce that my story 'Malachi'- first published in my collection A Hazy Shade Of Winter- is to be included in Never Again. I hope you'll buy the anthology, because the money you spend on it will go to as just and worthy a cause as you could hope to find.

A Brief Thought Apropos The Iraq Inquiry

William Shakespeare put it rather well a few hundred years ago:

Dogberry: 'Marry, sir, they have committed false report; moreover, they have spoken untruths; secondarily, they are slanders... thirdly, they have verified unjust things; and to conclude, they are lying knaves.'

Oh, and Tony Blair? Burn in hell for eternity, you lying, traitorous, mass-murdering, sanctimonious little cunt of a war criminal.

My apologies for the strong language. I just felt I had to list his good points.