The Lords’ intervention in the Brexit debate is very welcome. But there’s something very ghostly and ectoplasmic about it, like an 80s reunion party from beyond the grave. People you never expected to see on television ever again loom up out of the screen, like Jacob Marley, moaning and wailing. Thatcher veteran Norman Fowler – renowned before this as the author of history’s most crashingly dull political memoir, Ministers Decide – is now a smallscreen star once more as Lord Fowler, leader of the upper house, reading out the number of “contents” with headmasterly disapproval. Norman Tebbit is back in our living rooms, having his say on the fatuous absurdity of caring about foreigners. And Europhile Michael Heseltine counters him on principle, sacrificing his government job in the process.
Tomorrow in the Lords, Baron Beggs and Baron Askew – formerly Nick Beggs and Steve Askew of Kajagoogoo – will be tabling an amendment concerning post-Brexit levels of shyness; Baroness Sheedy, formerly Ally Sheedy, will raise the issue of breakfast clubs in schools; Baroness Cagney and Baroness Lacey will discuss legislation concerning co-operative policing measures after Britain goes it alone; and Lord Rat, formerly Roland, will resist any measures to discuss political donations.
Empire 2.0 strikes back
Whose idea was it to put “2.0” after a word to make it sound super-modern and relevant? Whitehall officials are said to have used the term “Empire 2.0” to describe what we should be aiming for in commercial links with African Commonwealth nations, meeting in London this week. Not horrible old tyrannical empire, of course, but Empire 2.0, like a systems upgrade. All the reach and profitability of old empire without the, erm, opening fire on civilians bit. I think the phrase started with “Web 2.0”, which sprang mysteriously into being to mean the new type of web that allowed user-generated material, thus creating social media. But that old British empire … its founders and administrators thought that was Empire 2.0, a big funky modern step up from the old empire of the Roman age. And, as for the coolly informal trade links part – well that was how India and the 13 American colonies got started, through private ventures. Empire 2.0 is another way of saying “Alt-empire” – a new gloss on a very old idea.
Out of office, out of mind
Is IBM trying to make itself the unpopular corporation to end all unpopular corporations? With breathtaking insolence, it has belatedly applied for and received a patent for history’s most annoying invention: the out-of-office email. You send someone an email, then forget about it until you receive a conceited and supercilious announcement that thank you so much, but this person is “out of the office” and therefore far too focused on their exciting life to attend to your silly little request just at this moment, so stop hassling them. Has anyone ever been grateful for this self-important and useless message? What will IBM think up now? Maybe a special out-of-office alert that rings you back and detains you from your business after you’ve left a voicemail, with a special recorded message, saying: “Look, I’m not in the office at the moment, but maybe – just maybe – I can attend to your submissive and wheedling request when I return.” Or perhaps you could hire a stressed-sounding butler to knock on people’s doors and say: “My extremely prestigious employer is not at home, and therefore unable to answer your impertinent letter.” My other objection, incidentally, is to people who send round-robin emails by sending it to themselves, BCC-ing you in, so you can’t see who else they’ve invited, though I accept that this also applies to traditional invitations through the post.
