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I’m not usually one who enjoys spending their time reading political memoirs (for the same reasons that I’m not usually one who enjoys spending their time in the company of wankers). However, I’ve made an exception — just this once — for my ramble-loving boi Rory: The oddball messiah of the centrist tribe (as he was supremely described by The Times in its review of this book). He did it best as prisons minister, inheriting a situation where 85,000 convicts were being jammed into 65,000 prison places and where, perversely, a third of prison officers had been sacrificed to austerity. Violence was rife, fuelled by drugs. He knew that access to them was 30 times higher in jails here than in Sweden. With support from his boss, David Gauke, he drew up a programme to fix the broken windows through which drone-delivered drugs arrived regularly, installing scanners, improving search procedures and setting clearer standards. Yet, in 2009, Rory found himself considering an unlikely move. David Cameron had reopened the Conservative candidates’ list to ‘anybody who wants to apply’. He decided to stand. Austerity was beginning to bite, and when a journalist suggested that his constituency was too prosperous to feel its effects, Stewart replied that parts of it were “pretty primitive” and some farmers used twine to hold up their trousers. Cue a media storm so vicious he contemplated suicide. But the tough hill farmers who he thought he’d insulted were more amused than outraged, and at the 2015 election his majority nearly doubled. Stewart realises that up against the aggressive exaggeration of the ERG, his allies are ‘like a book club going to a Millwall game’ Stewart, it seems, was confused that this roster of “the uncurious, uncritical, inept” were selected to build the modern Conservative Party instead of, erm, him. It is hard not to read into the thinly veiled subtext that the worst thing about Cameron is not his politics or his management style, nor his elevation of Liz Truss, but that he held little affection for Rory.
Politics On The Edge | Books Cumbria Politics On The Edge | Books Cumbria
Luke Harding’s Invasion: Russia’s Bloody War and Ukraine’s Fight for Survival, shortlisted for the Orwell prize, is published by Guardian Faber This is personified by Stewart’s recollection of the Conservative Party leadership race towards the end of the book. At times, the reader is left feeling frustrated and helpless to the remarkable events that unravel, much as Stewart appeared to have felt at the time. This feeling perfectly captures the sentiment of many members of the British electorate, from both sides of the political spectrum, whose interest in politics has declined in a linear manner to the increase in populistic tendencies in British politics. If you're coming to Coles by car, why not take advantage of the 2 hours free parking at Sainsbury's Pioneer Square - just follow the signs for Pioneer Square as you drive into Bicester and park in the multi-storey car park above the supermarket. Come down the travelators, exit Sainsbury's, turn right and follow the pedestrianised walkway to Crown Walk and turn right - and Coles will be right in front of you. You don't need to shop in Sainsbury's to get the free parking! Where to Find Us It doesn’t help that so few people at the top, or indeed anywhere else in politics, seem to have a clue what they’re doing. Time and again, ministers find themselves abruptly appointed to jobs for which they have little if any relevant experience, aptitude or even enthusiasm. Barely have they begun to get to grips with the role than they’re just as abruptly shunted off to another. Stewart deplores “how grotesquely unqualified so many of us were for the offices we were given”, and “a culture that prized campaigning over careful governing, opinion polls over detailed policy debates, announcements over implementation”. By the time he launches his bid for No10, he sounds so miserably disillusioned it’s a wonder he found the energy to sign his nomination papers. Your crude and uncouth reviewer longed for him to tell the game-playing whips to eff off when they insisted he stay in parliament and miss his train to Penrith; to face down the senior civil servant who accused him loudly and mutinously of using International Development as an ego trip. But the man from Cumbria wandered lonely as a cloud through all the turbulence, keeping his temper, doing his job.
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It is hard to disagree with any of Stewart’s conclusions, about the dire state of our politics, and the strange and empty character of its representatives. I was left wondering if he would have had a less bruising time as a Labour MP. In 2019 Johnson purged leading remainers and Stewart quit both the Tories and his seat. Last year he reinvented himself as one half of a hugely successful current affairs podcast, The Rest Is Politics, co-hosted with Alastair Campbell. From the former Conservative Cabinet minister and co-presenter of 2022's breakout hit podcast The Rest is Politics, a searing insider's account of ten extraordinary years in Parliament From the former Conservative Cabinet minister and co-presenter of 2022’s breakout hit podcast The Rest is Politics, a searing insider’s account of ten extraordinary years in Parliament In fact, much of The Abuse of Power is a similar exercise in self-styling as duty-bound, honest, fair, conscientious and co-operative. It is hard to leave the book without believing that at least some of this is a fair portrayal (though no one will leave the book with the impression that she is a wordsmith). PDF / EPUB File Name: Politics_On_the_Edge_-_Rory_Stewart.pdf, Politics_On_the_Edge_-_Rory_Stewart.epub
Politics on the Edge: A Memoir From Within, by Book review: Politics on the Edge: A Memoir From Within, by
From the former Cabinet minister and co-presenter of breakout hit podcastThe Rest of Politics,a searing insider's account of ten extraordinary years in Parliament It’s hard to talk about a book like this without talking too tiresomely about your own politics (which must inevitably come under scrutiny if you’re to write a full review), so I’ll instead simply say that I think Rory has given us a very good book: Politics on the Edge is sharply and poetically written. In fact, it is sometimes a smidge overwritten. But, despite this quibble, I nonetheless found myself drawing a stylistic comparison between Rory and George Orwell. Orwell was also an Old-Etonian-Old-Oxonian child of colonialism who went on to have a colourful self-examined life preoccupied with thoughts weighed down in the mires of worldly geopolitical philosophies. This (admittedly grandiloquent) comparison probably only occurred to me because I’ve lately been on something of an Orwell binge and, yes, linking Rory to one of the 20th-century’s Great Writers is undoubtedly an overreach; regardless, I found Politics on the Edge achieves some of the same suspenseful intensity of Homage to Catalonia as well as the searing anti-establishmentarian ire of The Road to Wigan Pier — odd, given that it was written by a centre-right conservative rather than Orwell’s democratic socialist hand. These days Stewart leads a non-profit organisation that gives cash handouts to the poor of East Africa, and, with Alastair Campbell, co-hosts every centrist dad’s favourite podcast, The Rest is Politics. He has also, however, found time to write this memoir, Politics on the Edge: the story of his 10 years as a Tory MP. It’s very good. Even so, I’m not sure I should recommend it. This is because it casts such a depressing light on Westminster that it may put the reader off voting ever again. On the plus side, the book is often entertaining. Stewart vividly records his encounters with the key figures of his time, and while it’s not necessarily breaking news that David Cameron is a glib hypocrite, Boris Johnson a charming liar and Liz Truss a gibbering nitwit, it’s enjoyable to read fresh evidence of it. Particularly amusing are Stewart’s memories of Steve Hilton, the shoeless svengali of Cameron’s No10. During one visit of Downing Street, the author finds Hilton on the floor gazing at a map, murmuring: “F— me, look how big Scotland is. This is just f—ing mad, man.” When serving as a minister under Truss he recalls her requesting him to slash the budget of his department by 20 per cent. Stewart expressed natural consternation at such an ask, but Truss reassured him: “I have a mentor who is a very successful businessman who says all businesses can always be cut by 20 per cent.” So, when Stewart rattles off the innumerable social, moral and political failings of some colleagues he – more often than not – seems to have a perfectly legitimate case.Uncompromising, candid and darkly humorous, Politics On the Edge is his story of the challenges, absurdities and realities of political life and a remarkable portrait of our age. Politics On the Edge invites us into the mind of one of the most interesting actors on the British political stage. Uncompromising, candid and darkly humorous, this is his story of the challenges, absurdities and realities of political life; a new classic of political memoir and a remarkable portrait of our age.
Politics On the Edge: A Memoir from Within by Rory Stewart Politics On the Edge: A Memoir from Within by Rory Stewart
The first is the narrative about the British political system. It is genuinely enlightening to be introduced to the various byzantine structures that a politician must navigate through the raw eyes of a naive first-timer: the party machine (whips, wannabe grandees & the PM inclusive), the British press, and the Civil Service. The first impressions are laughable and absurd. After twenty chapters, it becomes hard to laugh. But the overall narrative seems to be that no one is really in charge, and no one is interested in taking charge. No one is concerned about the details, except for all the people too concerned with the details. Yes, Minister prefigured this by forty years, but it is harder to swallow when you realise that it really, really is true. The most comically dark passage is Stewart's determination to cease funding to north-west Syria, for fear that the UK government is inadvertently cashing up members of al-Qaeda. Months of flying Bond-like around the world to find out who truly possesses the authority to cut the program leaves him with no answers. He had been told that the decision had to come, variously, from him, from the secretary of state, from the prime minister, from MI5 or MI6, from the NSC, from Cabinet, from the senior civil servants within his department, from the embassy on the ground, from the foreign secretary, even from the American president. Despite all this, the funding never stops. That is, until months later when Stewart was proved entirely correct: Britain had been sending money that ended up in the hands of al-Qaeda. As soon as bad press was on the horizon, the funding stopped... When Stewart talks of political communication rather than decision making, someone like Baudrillard would find himself surprised precisely never. Discussions about policy have been hollowed out by a party machine obsessed with shaping the narrative, a fourth estate obsessed with misrepresenting it, and a constituency of voters obsessed with ignoring it. Rory Stewart interview: ‘I fought an existential fight against Boris Johnson, who is a terrible human being’ ] Penance completed, Stewart embarked on a ministerial career that provides the main course in this feast of political insight. Rarely before has the life of a government minister been described in such granular detail or with such literary flair. Consequently, Stewart’s new book, Politics On the Edge, is anything but just another House of Commons memoir. It’s genuinely eye-opening stuff, always riveting, often horrifying, his colleagues depicted as either preening and arrogant or shady and duplicitous, frequently both. It benefits from two crucial factors: firstly, it’s very well written; and secondly, its author adheres to the rule that the best autobiographical writing tells it like it is, and doesn’t pull punches. His erstwhile Tory colleagues will not thank him for this. From 1st July 2021, VAT will be applicable to those EU countries where VAT is applied to books - this additional charge will be collected by Fed Ex (or the Royal Mail) at the time of delivery. Shipments to the USA & Canada:Rory Stewart was never going to be prime minister. He had far too many glaring flaws. For one, he’d held a variety of difficult jobs in the real world (soldier, diplomat, professor at Harvard), rather than becoming a Spad straight out of Oxford, like modern MPs are meant to. For another, his speeches made it sound as if he’d given actual thought to the subject at hand, rather than just reciting a list of crowd-pleasing soundbites scripted by a strategist. Most damaging of all, however, was the inescapable impression that he said things because he genuinely meant them, rather than because a pollster had told him they would be popular. As a result, he was entirely unsuited to modern politics, and his campaign to become PM in 2019 ended in swift and crushing failure. How do you feel, about the other parts of the job,’ John persisted, ‘now that you have real power? It’s a drug, isn’t it, power? I bet you’re glad now you didn’t give up on being an MP.’ Loved the parts when Rory realises the reality of power in modern state and politics and an absolute highlight is this part when he is the most junior minister at the Department for the Environment and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) :
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