The Retro Journey

There's been a calculated policy of avoiding politics in the blog - you don't want to put people off - but there comes a time when you just have to have a say.


My nanny - the lady who looked after me when I was a kid and mum was out at work - told me that thee were a couple of things I shouldn't do.

1 Don't smoke
2 Don't tell anyone your politics

Being an obedient kind of kid, I have followed her counsel to the letter.

Of course over the years there's a natural assumption that because I work for the Guardian that I must be some furrow browed liberal.

But I'm a complex chap and I have learned over the years that many a prejudice emerges from assumption.

I've been working on the politics website over the past couple of weeks and it's been party conference time in Britain.

The Labour one was full of fighting talk about the party not going lamely to the gallows of the next election.

The Lib Dems seemed to be saying we've got some very good ideas and on Monday the Tories seemed to be saying we will mess up our chances of a whopping victory by reminding people exactly why they voted for Labour back in 1997.

The election has to be held before June 2010 and so far there's been talk of chopping benefits, making the NHS more efficient by offering people a "post bureaucratic" landscape.

And then there's a kerfuffle over participation in Europe. A desire to maintain certain powers for the national government rather than have a European wide modus operandi.

I just love it. I said to one of my colleagues listening to the radio before I went to work made me feel I was back in 1993 when this was the talk on the airwaves.

No need for rejuvenating facelifts. Just bring on the timewarp Tories and feel as if you have not developed.

A very sharp contrast to The Tomorrow People.