A sunny day with occasion short cloudbursts, more like spring than autumn. After breakfast, I drove Ann to the station for her return journey to Felixstowe, then responded to new incoming messages, sent out the readings for next Sunday and tweaked next week's Sway edition before doing my share of the housework. Then I wrote to my GP about a repeat prescription or alternative treatment for the facial wart which hasn't gown but also hasn't shrunk in the year since I last consulted a doctor about it.
Clare cooked delicious hake for lunch. As I didn't get quite enough sleep I took an armchair siesta after eating and slept for an hour, then went for my usual circuit of the park. Having prepared Morning Prayer for St Francis' Day I worked on a reflection to go with it ready to record when I get quiet time to do so.
In the evening we watched an interesting documentary about painter Henri Matisse on BBC Four, and then Laura Kuenssberg's account of the resignation of Boris Johnston and the premiership of Liz Truss. 'State of Chaos' has been a valuable account of the past four years of Conservative government, through interviews with participants in the drama, giving their own interpretation of events, with Kuenssberg as story teller.
The bottom line according to Simon McDonald head of the diplomatic service who resigned in 2020 is that despite a chaotic and messy process, the British constitutional system succeeded in dispatching two successive Prime Ministers unable to govern with the confidence of Parliament and the public, and see through a change in Head of State and Prime Minister in the same week without this being due to a coup d'état. Evidence of the robustness and resilience of a rules based system based on historical precedence without there being one binding formal written legal document
Just as well it worked in my opinion, as the established way of conducting political life in Britain, flawed and complex though it may be, started to deteriorate after Prime Minister David Cameron announced Brexit referendum and over the years since then continued to spiral into this state of chaos in which the government lost both integrity and credibility. It has exposed the unfitness for office of elected members whose self serving motives, moral weaknesses or sheer incompetence have contributed to the chaos, and hopefully these will not be re-elected if they dare stand for Parliament again.
Will it be possible to reverse this decline in Parliamentary relationships and discourse when a new and hopefully different Parliament is elected next year? I hope and pray it will.
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