Glimmers of light

My New Year resolution is to accentuate the positive. One of the best things I did in December was to attend a zoom teach-in featuring Greta Thunberg and Naomi Klein. That was inspiring, but also a reminder that my succumbing to despair would be a huge encouragement to people I really don’t want to support, so…look on the bright side.

Already, I see a glimmer of hope. This year’s honours list rewards intelligent, independent people who’ve made a massive contribution - but have also been critical of government: Sir Michael Marmot, Chris Bryant. As Marmot says, that decision says “something very good about Britain”, in that we value stuff that’s good for us as a whole, whether or no it suits the interests of the governing party.

Which is not surprising at all, until you look at the track record of Johnson and Truss, whose only concern was to reward their own cronies and further their control of the House of Lords. That Sunak is prepared to reverse that trend, and go back to a wider, more objective view of awarding honours, is progress of a kind, however small.