In Saturday’s extract from Quentin Letts’ new book, he turned his gimlet eye on a new class of smug, condescending, finger-wagging people who never tire of telling us what to do and think. Today, he reveals the worst offender of them all . . .
Do you remember the Man from Del Monte, who appeared in the Eighties adverts for a brand of juice and tinned fruit? The commercials would show a farm in some dusty country, with a rich hombre in a white suit arriving to test the fruit while the impecunious locals waited nervously for his verdict.
Eventually, the visitor vouchsafed a curt nod of approval, and up went the exuberant cry: ‘The man from Del Monte. He say yes!’
Richard Branson has topped the list of Quentin Letts’ Patronising Bastards for cultivating an image of anguished altruist
You wouldn’t get away with that sort of advert these days. Insufficiently egalitarian. So what made rich whitey Sir Richard Branson, bounteous bwana to the world’s little people, think he could get away with a scheme called ‘The Elders’?
It’s the ultimate example of talking down to people — and his part in it makes him numero uno in my list of the top Patronising Bastards.
Bearded box-wallah Branson makes out he is a caring, sharing guy. He has created for himself an image of laid-back dude, the ordinary guy, your baby-boom groover next door. He portrays himself as such an anguished altruist, open-collared and long-haired, you wonder that he even knows phrases such as ‘mark-up’ or ‘bottom line’.
In fact, he is a tight-biting businessman who has run his companies with flinty acumen and grabbed a packet for himself. He has an interest in globalised pay rates, international commodity prices and the Western banking system. Please don’t call it exploitation, but this is certainly capitalism in the raw.
He is also a remorseless collector of phone numbers of the fashionable and mighty. When it comes to climbing, he is in the clematis league, a name-dropper of the first water, vain, self-important, a prize specimen of that genus Bastardus (patronisingae).
Branson’s Virgin trains are expensive. They are airless, cramped, have stinking khazis and, like other railway operators, flush away billions of pounds in public subsidies. If any other company ran such a foul service at our expense, we would pelt it with cabbages, but because it is run by Branson, and because Branson has groomed his reputation even more assiduously than he does that frightful beard, Virgin is somehow given a comfortable ride. If only the same could be said for its passengers.
Richard Branson and Barack Obama during the former president’s visit to Moskito Island and Necker Island
Broadcasters would normally regard the knighted boss of a public-contract transport business with suspicion. A mate of prime ministers and presidents who lives abroad (his main residence is his Caribbean island) yet lands beefy government contracts? He would surely be subjected to scrutiny.
When he left his luxurious home of a morning or glided into some swanky awards dinner, he would be monstered by a TV inquisitor such as Michael Crick or Louis Theroux asking tricky questions.
‘Three billion pounds of public subsidy for your rail business, Sir Richard — why does an alleged entrepreneur of your calibre need such handouts from the state?’ we can imagine the gallant Crick shouting before being stiff-armed by bodyguards.
It doesn’t happen. Branson is treated by many broadcasters as some sort of guru. Is it because they think he is a liberal? Yet he is no great democrat. Five days after the British people voted to leave the EU, Remainer Branson was given an easy hit on ITV’s breakfast television to demand a second referendum.
The electorate had not understood the gravity of its decision, we were informed. The stock market had slumped. Bank shares were in crisis. We were going to go into recession and jobs were doomed. Branson did his trademark shake of the head — a gesture that seems to say ‘you fools’ — and the camera dwelt on his blond fringe, teased up like pampas grass, Gloria Hunniford in a breeze.
Five days after the British people voted to leave the EU, Remainer Branson demanded a second referendum on TV
Yet the stock market bounced back strongly, bank shares rose, growth increased and employment reached a record high. He was so comprehensively wrong, you wonder how this booby ever made a bob on investments.
Why is he so esteemed? The Beeb included him in its ‘100 Greatest Britons’ poll — he came 85th, one behind steam-engine inventor James Watt, one in front of U2’s Bono (not even British). He is frequently hailed as an authority on drugs policy. Why? Because he sits on something called the Global Commission on Drugs. But this is a self-appointed body of has-beens, wannabes and second-division statesmen. He is an expert because he says he is!
A ‘global commission’ sounds important but is meaningless. In reality, it is a self-acclaiming global coterie that presumes moral superiority and imagines itself to stand above democratically elected politicians.
Richard Branson was 85th in the BBC’s list of the 100 Greatest Britons, one behind steam-engine inventor James Watt, one in front of U2’s Bono
This commission is classic Branson: a gathering of passe meddlers, who get promoted as ‘highly respected’ and are set up as dispassionate authorities. They may, in fact, be engaged in a campaign to liberalise drugs.
Personally, I have a measure of sympathy for that — that gives away my own roots in the liberal elite. But it is so sensitive an area of public policy that it should not be decided by some ex-record-company boss and a posse of dud ex-presidents (Switzerland, Portugal, Colombia, Malawi, Poland, Brazil, Nigeria, Greece), ‘public intellectuals’ (Mario Vargas Llosa, the late Carlos Fuentes) plus that nincompoop Nick Clegg.
To me, the commission just looks like a bunch of desperadoes anxious to increase their brand virtue. Sadly, its output is swallowed by editors and officials who are eager to suck up to a rich man who once did a few ballooning adventures and now brings the same egomaniacal energy to his political views.
In 2007, Branson hit on another wheeze to promote himself and associate himself with some of the big names of international ‘thought leadership’. He went to Nelson Mandela and, having observed they shared a birthday (July 18), proposed that they mark the great day for perpetuity by creating a group called The Elders.
Just as tribal societies had village elders who were repositories of wisdom and experience, so, thought Branson, the world needed a group of gnarled Solomons who could be consulted at moments of dilemma or difficulty. The world needed him, the benevolent, blessed Branson.
The Elders would be given a seat and the global population would sit at their feet and wait, expectantly, until words of sage advice croaked from their parchment-dry larynxes.
The Elders have spoken. The Elders (like the man from Del Monte) say yes!
Who was going to elect these Elders? Foolish question. They would be selected by Branson and his friend Peter Gabriel, a faded pop singer. What do you call someone who selects world authorities? The Almighty? That may be how Branson sees himself.
Branson and his angel Gabriel came up with a list of Elders. It included former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan (he’s on the Global Drugs Commission, too), ex-U.S. President Jimmy Carter, Irish ex-President and windbag Mary Robinson, Mandela’s wife Graca Machel and Martti Ahtisaari, the Finnish ex-President (whose aperçus include ‘wars and conflicts are caused by human beings’. Gold star for Martti, please.)
The Elders were presented as an answer to global problems. They issued an annual review, which ‘expressed concern’ (about things such as climate change and, more recently, Donald Trump) and painted their ‘vision’ (usually for ‘co-operation’ or ‘solidarity’ or ‘safeguarding civil space’ or for ‘bold and decisive action’, provided that decisiveness did not include anyone with non- liberal views).
Champion of democracy — as long as his side wins
One Remain lost, Paddy Ashdown tried to contest the result
Before the first results came in, former Lib Dem leader Lord Ashdown said: ‘I will forgive no one who does not respect the sovereign voice of the British people once it has spoken, whether it is a majority of one per cent or 20 per cent. When the British people have spoken you do what they command. Either you believe in democracy or you don’t.’
Command! Such a Paddy Ashdown word. He himself was in the Armed forces once, y’know — Special Boat Squadron Paddy, paddling ashore by moonlight with a length of cheese wire to slit enemy throats before you can say ‘lost deposit’.
The one snag? When he said all that about accepting the democratic vote, he thought Remain would win. Once Remain lost, he tried to contest the result. If it is possible for a commando to torpedo his own inflatable, dumbo Paddy did it.
They were served by a clever young secretariat, which created a website encouraging activists to make their voices heard in the ‘global village’.
So much effort, so slickly presented. And the world paid them almost no attention.
It therefore seems the very least one can do — drum roll, please — is to invite Sir Richard to step forward and accept the garland as the snootiest of the snoots, the all-comers’ champion when it comes to being a patronising swine.
- Adapted from Patronising Bastards: How The Elites Betrayed Britain, by Quentin Letts, published by Constable on October 12 at £16.99. © Quentin Letts 2017. To order a copy for £13.59 (offer valid until October 14, 2017) visit mailshop.co.uk/books or call 0844 571 0640. P&P is free on orders over £15.
The patron saint of political correctness
Harriet Harman should have been in the SAS. Yes, I know it’s hard to envisage the Rt Hon Lady, QC, with her Greenham Common peace-camp views, abseiling through the windows of some foreign embassy to hurl stun-grenades at hostage-takers, or spray hot lead at some sultan of terrorism.
Harriet with her face smeared in camouflage cream, lighting up a Marlboro after despatching turbanned zealots (or ‘members of our ethnic community’ as she might prefer). Only in the more vivid, sheet-ripping dreams of Boris Johnson would this occur.
Despite being born to privilege — daughter of a Harley Street doctor, schooled privately, a cousin of the aristocratic Pakenham family — she is Labour’s venerated mother hen.
Harriet Harman is Labour’s venerated mother hen despite being born into privilege, writes Quentin Letts
Nevertheless, she would have been a good fit for our special forces, for the following reason: booby traps. One of the skills required of an SAS soldier is sabotage and leaving behind nasty surprises.
Harriet did the political equivalent when, as leader of the Commons and minister for women and equality in the last Labour government, she used her twin positions to secure time for a Bill that would hard-wire political correctness through every aspect not just of Whitehall, but also British public life.
The Equality Act 2010 was her booby trap. It only just squeaked through in time before Westminster broke up for the general election in May of that year, which Labour lost. But what it enshrined in law was the principle of the Equality Impact Assessment.
Equality what? If you do not know what one of those is, you are not a member of the ruling class.
Put simply, the Act imposed on all public authorities the duty to do three things: i) eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation; ii) advance equality of opportunity between minorities and the majority; iii) foster good relations between those minorities and the mainstream.
The Equality Act 2010 was Harriet Harman’s booby trap, writes Quentin Letts, saying it ‘only just squeaked through in time before Westminster broke up for the general election’
These legal stipulations came as a career-boost to finger-waggers, because they meant public bodies had to be able to show they were actively being nice to minorities.
Which, in turn, meant employing lots of people who can not only identify discrimination but also measure it, box that data into reports and present those reports back to their employers, who can then wave them at lawyers to show that the Act’s requirements have been satisfied.
Thus is an entire sector created. A new profession — that of the Equality Impact Assessor — is born. And all thanks to Ms Harman, Peckham’s answer to Eva Peron.
For the People Who Know Better, nothing is so handy — so deliciously clerical and legalistic — as an impact assessment. Civil servants grasped right away that Equality Impact Assessments have made them masters and mistresses of inertia. Politicians can propose what they want, but if their reforms fail to pass an Equality Impact Assessment, well, that’s the end of the reform.
By the time the impact assessment has been commissioned, conducted at glacial speed in the face of shrieking objections from special interest groups and their lobbyists, checked, sat on, published, objected to again, sent to the courts, discussed on the Today programme, rejected by the courts, sent for appeal and so on and so on, the original policy — which was approved by the electorate — will be found to be ‘not worth the candle’.
Quentin Letts says ‘queen bee’ is a suitable term for the Labour politician, as queens give life to thousands of worker bees
It will then be quietly dropped, politicians saying that they have ‘listened and shown we are not unreasonable’. Democracy 0, Status Quo about 20.
Behold the paralysis of democracy and a feast for litigators and approved assessors.
Equalities is now a whole field of careers and consultancies, piggy-backing on the greater bureaucratisation of life. The sector is composed of training courses, indoctrination procedures, advice leaflets, symposia, compliance officers, ombudsmen, gender neutrality awareness, diversity managers, inclusion examiners, exclusion litigation specialists, key equality partnerships, community outreach programmes, equality implementation strategies, intervention advisers, inclusive environment auditors and more.
Harriet Harman might bridle at the term ‘queen bee’ — a touch gender specific — but it is suitable given that a queen bee gives life to thousands of worker bees, henceforth to be known as inclusion and diversity managers.
As the SAS might say, mission accomplished.