Jan 01

2025

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Helen Whitten

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Dear England: let’s make 2025 a year to celebrate

When I was young in the 1950s, those post-war days, we used to salute soldiers when they passed us by on the road.  We were grateful for the courage and efforts of our servicemen and women.  We even saluted the AA or RAC service vans when they passed if we had the same badge. A sense of loyalty and pride in our country was endemic in everything around us.  My father had fought in the war, my mother and sister had been at home when a bomb fell on their house. When we went to London my mother would wear a hat and we would be dressed up smart, as if to ward off threats, to mask the sadness and the horror their generation had witnessed. There were bomb sites everywhere.  The fragility of life and the need to bond together was tangible.

So it saddens me when I read how politicians, the media and influencers endlessly drag our country down yet seldom put any historical or factual context on their criticisms. We were, according to them, the worst empire, the worst colonials, the worst abusers of slaves, failing to mention all the other nations and dictators throughout history, and more recently, that were empire-builders, slave-owners and brutal in the process.  Think Egypt, Africa, India, China, Russia, the Romans, Greeks, Turks, and more recently the millions slaughtered in labour camps by Stalin, Hitler, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot. Nor is there any mention of what we did, and continue to do as a country, to remedy these events nor of our commendable role in ending slavery. It’s fashionable to sling arrows at Churchill but I wonder how happy those who do so would be had he not played his part in winning the war and instead we, and our neighbours in Europe, were being ruled by Nazis?

When Gareth Southgate wrote his Dear England letter to the English football team he referred back to our history, to his grandfather’s role in World War II, to his own childhood and what living in England meant to him and why he felt proud to represent the country, and why the team could – in fact needed to – do the same.  We don’t have inspirational leaders at the moment to draw us together in a diverse but cohesive sense of belonging to a country of which we can feel proud.  We shall have to do this for ourselves.

If we are to get ourselves out of this decline, we need to stop this self-flagellation and get reading more history books.  Context is essential if one is to make aspersions, yet in the age of TikTok, evidence or in-depth historical tracts or facts are not required, it seems.  A headline can sway a whole group to take up a position despite not really knowing anything about it.  Look at the student pro-Palestine protests where many of those on the streets and campuses did not understand the history nor the meaning of the words they were chanting.

There was too much of the Tudors and the Stuarts in our history lessons perhaps, yes. The world has changed and a balance has needed to be made, though no country’s history classes can cover the whole world.  But the way people speak of England and its history (and it’s only going to get worse under Bridget Phillipson’s ‘decolonising’ policies) is the equivalent of shoving a whole country into the stocks and pelting it with rotten tomatoes without fully understanding why one is doing so. And that is totally un-English because justice and the creation of the common law and a legal system that all can access has been one of our greatest achievements, together with the development of the institutions of government, both of which have been adopted by other countries around the world. English common law has proved to be the basis of the most successful legal systems in the world, not only because it is the basis of legal systems of so many other jurisdictions, including those in the United States, but it is also voluntarily adopted for multitudinous international business transactions and arbitrations, even in cases where there is no connection with Britain. 

Since 1688 we have enjoyed the relative stability that our constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy provides.  On our doorstep in Europe almost every country has experienced autocracy, a dictatorship that was either fascist or communist, or occupation by a foreign force.  This has not been our history.  We have also geographically been islanders, and all this leaves us with a different sense of ourselves.  Inter-generational memory and trauma leaves a population with triggers – we can see this with how concerned Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Finland and Poland are now that Putin has once again shown Russia’s desire to recover land from Ukraine, despite the independence these countries have won. It is essential that we wake up to the fact that Russia and China are intent on weakening and dividing our society by hacking our security systems and infrastructure and undermining our certainties via their social media bots.

Perhaps because of being brought up in the post-war environment I am fully aware that peace cannot be taken for granted, nor can the wonderful changes we have seen in human rights during my lifetime.  We only have to look at Iran and Afghanistan to see how women’s rights can be cruelly overturned within days. The LGBT community may now take their freedoms for granted but it only takes some mad Ayatollah-type for these to be denied. Our way of life, our culture, civilisation and values must be protected, and we can’t do that if we constantly drag it down.

So open your eyes, as we enter into 2025, and remind yourself how lucky you are, despite the challenges, the grey skies and windy weather. We have a free health service (we hope will survive!), and the welfare state (though perhaps this is now so generous this may not survive). In my childhood there was no central heating – we had to get dressed in bed or by the fire in the morning. Several of my friends had outdoor loos. Few people had washing machines, dishwashers or tumble driers until the 1960s or 1970s. Don’t take all the advances of the 21st century for granted. If Putin knocks out our infrastructure, we shall, as they are currently experiencing in Ukraine – have none of it – heat, water, wifi, mobile phones, Google maps. We would need to have the resilience within us to manage such conditions, as the Ukrainians are proving they have.

To maintain our economic place in the world we need to pull together, work hard and help others to do the same.  There are millions out of work. I presume the majority are genuinely unable to work but I believe others could be supported back into the workplace for King and country, so to speak. We all suffer if the economy suffers and losing our entrepreneurs and high earners is going to do nothing for the tax available for our infrastructure.

We are a nation of innovators. We should not forget this.  The Industrial Revolution happened here.  More recently, Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web. We have heroes and can be proud of them, just like other countries are proud of theirs. We have been self-deprecating for too long. In a global environment this doesn’t work. What message does it give to young people if we delete our scientists out of some weird sense of colonial shame? They changed the world for the better. We need our young to find that same entrepreneurial and creative spirit and put their energy into innovating and building businesses of all kinds. This means sharing our knowledge. A 22-year old I spoke to recently complained that his boss is seldom in the office, so when he needs advice or direction he has to phone or Zoom him but he finds him miles away and distracted, so has to carry on without his guidance.  This problem will be mirrored across organisations public and private. How will people build bridges that stand up or planes that fly if they don’t learn from those with the knowledge?

I know many of us are nervous of the future. We certainly stand at a precarious point in history, with Ukraine, the Middle East, Trump, China and Taiwan, Korea, and many unsettled areas of Africa and the world, plus climate change. Despair gets us nowhere, not in our personal lives and certainly not in the energy we bring to our own communities and country. Without inspiring leaders, we have to become leaders of our own lives. We can each of us look to where we can play our part in being the solution to these issues, problem-solving, taking action to remedy what we can, rather than sitting around feeling despondent. We know only too well ourselves whether we are doing all we can for our workplace, for our families and community. We don’t need to be told by others. As Gareth Southgate wrote to his team “Look. That’s the way to represent your country. That’s what England is about. That is what’s possible.”

I have travelled extensively, lived my early years in Portugal, have lived on and off in France, and love the world and its people but England has a special place in my heart. I love the little country lanes, the churches, carols, cathedrals, public libraries, literature, sense of humour, music and art.  Our theatre draws people from across the world. For a tiny country we have accomplished extraordinary things, and I hope we shall continue to do so.

I wish you a very happy new year and hope that 2025 will bring you personal happiness and fulfilment and that each of us can come together to create a positive future and peace here and in the world.

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Dec 17

2024

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Helen Whitten

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The Trials and Joys of being a Writer

“An insightful and exciting read: Helen Whitten’s new novel set in Moscow is a great read. She skilfully evokes the atmosphere of the times and her story of love and intrigue is a real page turner.” Amazon reader 5*

It’s a year now since No Lemons in Moscow was published (and still not too late to buy it for a Christmas present!) It is so lovely to get 4 and 5* reviews on Amazon and know I have given some people a few pleasurable hours of reading.

Writing a novel is a solitary business.  One has to take time to be in the heads and hearts and intentions of one’s characters, think about who they are, how they came to be that person, what their intentions and responses might be. What an interesting, and somewhat frightening, experience it is, then, to unleash these characters and their story out into the public sphere.  Although I had written several non-fiction books related to my career as a business coach, publishing my novel No Lemons in Moscow was so much more of a personal experience: it contains a part of me, my emotions, perceptions and my understanding of people and life.  Here I’m describing characters who are often a mishmash of people I have actually met, and some fictional ones I am glad I never shall meet! 

On publication one hopes that the reader will understand who each character is, and why they do the things they do.  I didn’t want to make my main protagonist, Kate, into some perfect creature who got everything right.  I wanted her to be vulnerable, to be a woman who is understood for having come out of a bad marriage, whose father died just as she was becoming a woman, whose mother fell to pieces afterwards and became an alcoholic. A woman who also lost a baby son and wants to create a charity in his memory.  All these events shape a person and can chip away at confidence, so when a handsome young Russian pays her a great deal of attention she is inevitably flattered, and then also sold into his dream of exposing corruption in the Russian system, as infrastructure is sold off to the oligarchs.  What a cause. What an adventure. He’s her Navalny.

Some people found her infatuation with Valentin difficult to grasp – “she’s 35 years old, she’s a grown up, she wouldn’t fall for someone in that way” but age doesn’t always blunt these feelings, nor make one as wise as one might wish to be!  Look at Robert Harris’ recent excellent book, Precipice, detailing the extraordinary obsession Prime Minister Asquith had in his sixties with the very young Venetia Stanley. But it is a never-ending challenge for the writer to convince the reader and so one is continuously honing the craft to better express the twists and turns of emotions, relationships and life.

There is also the practical and emotional side of getting the job done, sitting down at one’s desk even when one’s mind does not have a clue what will come next. It’s a combination of motivation, some self-discipline and quite a lot of determination to overcome the self-doubt that can drive one into distractions like checking emails, loading the dishwasher, or, worse, writing block.

No Lemons in Moscow is set partly in the post-Soviet era of Russia, from Gorbachev to Putin, and partly in London during its “Londongrad” period. Alongside the knowledge I gained from my two trips to Russia, I had to spend hours in research, reading as many books and documents as possible to give the nitty-gritty detail of what life might be like in the places I set the novel.  My cupboard is still packed with papers, books, newspaper cuttings, pages of plot plans, mind maps of chapters, timelines, arcs of characters.  Perhaps I shall have a large bonfire of it all one day, but not just yet.

In writing one has to convince oneself, over and over, that it is worth making a start, writing the first few pages. I am not alone – and I am sure many of you who read this are also writers – in working a sentence in a multitude of different ways to try to convey what I mean. Then waking in the middle of the night to think of a better way of expressing this, or realizing one needs to rework the whole of a section in order to make it more dramatic.  Then one has to convince oneself, over and over, that it is worth carrying on. But what surprised me was that I discovered I did have the patience to do this and even enjoyed the endless editing… and editing some more. Unlike non-fiction, where one can more-or-less gauge whether one is writing rubbish or not, writing fiction is something one will only know has met its mark when one gets reader feedback.  So, the Amazon and other reviews are invaluable to me.

The whole episode has also been an eye-opener back into the publishing world I left many years ago. The teaching of creative writing has become quite an industry now. People promise to teach you the perfect formula for writing a bestseller, how to write the perfect synopsis, the perfect pitch letter to an agent that will guarantee your book gets taken up, the perfect template for the ‘cosy murder mystery’ (it does seem a bit strange to me that murder should have ended up being branded ‘cosy’ – but there we are, and people love them!).

Then there are the publishers and booksellers who want you to define your book within an exact genre and woe betide you if your book straddles a few and can’t exactly fit.  My publishers plumped for No Lemons in Moscow being defined as ‘literary fiction’.  Yet when I look at my bookshelves full of books I read through the 1960s-2000, genre was less of an issue and many of the best books definitely could not be pigeon-holed.

Nonetheless, I very much appreciate what I have learnt from my creative writing tutors and editors. I have picked up a great deal and am indebted to them – especially the one who pointed out that someone couldn’t possibly attempt to escape kidnap by bashing open the door in front of him if he had his hands tied behind his back. Quick rewrite! At the same time, I think many of us writers are concerned not to end up with some formulaic result.  The reason we write is because something inside us is pressing to be said. There have been endless thrillers, spy stories, love stories written century after century and yet each one is unique in its way, each one introduces the reader to new characters, new ideas, new events or relationships. Each one expands your mind and imagination just a tad. As the writer George R R Martin said, “a reader lives a thousand lives where someone who doesn’t read only lives one.”

It has indeed been heart-warming to receive some lovely feedback from people who have enjoyed No Lemons. Even if one person has received pleasure from reading it, that makes it worthwhile as it had to be written. It couldn’t stay inside me. So having many nice comments and 4* and 5* ratings has made me feel the effort was worthwhile.  

As an aside, and as it’s Christmas, I will mention that I’ve also recently published a new collection of poetry, The Safety of Small Things, which is contemporary poetry and could just be an excellent stocking-filler for a loved one! I find I have to get into another mindset to write poetry – more of a dream state, observing what is around me. Anyway, I hope you enjoy them.

All available on Amazon, of course, or No Lemons in Moscow can be ordered from your local bookshop, so do support them if you can.

Happy Christmas and Festive Season to you all and thank you for your support, Helen

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Dec 05

2024

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Helen Whitten

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How has the “Be Kind” brigade become so cruel?

We were told that Woke stood for Awakening, to wake up to where we needed to become more tolerant, open, aware of bias and inequity.  We were told that it was about being “kind”.  How has it happened, then, that we are actually waking up to a world that is less tolerant, more divided and cruel than I have ever known it in my lifetime?

Every day we read of vitriol on social media, of people being threatened with death, rape, harm to family should they express an opinion that is not considered “acceptable”. Such a person or group posting this unpleasantness often hides behind an anonymous or false user-name.  These words would probably not be expressed in a similar way if people were actually to meet face-to-face or be looking one another in the eye, but on social media people seem to think they can say whatever disgusting things they like. Some, no doubt, do this without fully being aware of the impact of the words.  Others will be writing these words deliberately to threaten, to frighten, and to silence.

We have come to a place that is similar to a child’s playground and yet the grown-ups have left the room.  We are left in a world where sending people to Coventry is commonplace, where Chinese Whispers end up getting spread and ruining a person’s career, or life, without due process of the law.  We are in a place where pointing fingers of blame at anyone and everyone happens every day but where a finger very seldom points back at the person who is doing the accusing, so there is little personal responsibility or personal awareness of their own part in a situation.  Telling tales and snitching is the norm in business and politics, where people run to a boss or HR to report feeling offended by something someone said.  Name calling and labelling those who have a different viewpoint is used as a way of shaming the person into silence – “bigot, racist, transphobe, Islamophobe” etc – so there is no real will in hearing another person’s opinion. And cancelling the lecturer who might talk on subjects that are not popular to some majority view removes the threat of anyone actually being able to challenge their own opinions. Or, as happened at the Oxford Union this week, the audience turn like a mob on a speaker who doesn’t conform to their world view. Manners and respect go out of the window, as does curiosity.

This is the most intolerant and judgemental period of my life.  Forgiveness, or an effort to understand the ambiguities and subtleties of life, have been discarded.  It is a black and white world where you are either with me or against me, either good or bad, and if you have a different opinion to me then you are bad, if not actually evil.

How have we got here?  It has been building up over several years now and is silencing people’s ability to joke, to speak out about what they believe in, or even to test out ideas as a group, for fear of saying something someone in the group dislikes because then you’re in trouble. Cancelled.

You aren’t allowed to make mistakes.  Young men have always been rather clumsy in their first attempts at wooing and my generation generally forgave them (sometimes too much) but no young person, whatever their sex, knows exactly what to do when they first get together with the person they are attracted to.  It is a learning curve that can often take several years to discover what works best.  Yet it seems that if you get it wrong these days you can be sent to Coventry, as was apparently the case of Oxford student Alexander Rogers, who tragically committed suicide.

The Sunday Times of 1 December carried some heartbreaking stories of university students nervous of speaking up. They shared experiences of being ostracised, sidestepped by friends and isolated if they said or did something perceived as wrong or offensive, or out of kilter with the current groupthink.  Building a social network of friends at university is so important but how can you know who your friends are in this tribal world, where making one small mistake can have you cruelly shoved out of the group. 

Who have we become that we are so unforgiving, that we don’t realise that we spend the whole of our lives, not just our childhood, learning, adapting and improving ourselves.  Personal development doesn’t stop when we leave school. We are continually learning and reinventing ourselves as we go through different phases of life and in this we have to listen to others, be curious, and take the odd risk to push ourselves into a new career, direction or relationship.

This is very far from any “kind” generation.  It is more a world of “Lord of the Flies” and subtle and not-so-subtle bullying and threatening, so that no one dares to have a different opinion or to bother to really think why people have formed a set of opinions, or whether they are based on facts or context. 

The sad truth is that we can’t always be kind to everyone.  If we are kind to one set of people, we can’t always be as kind to another set.  Such is life, and any government has to make difficult decisions, knowing that giving money in one direction will mean that some other group will go without.

However, this doesn’t mean you don’t have compassion for both sides, or for all needs, even if you can’t actively help everyone.  You don’t have to have a firm preference for one side or another but in this day and age apparently you aren’t allowed to see in shades of grey. The subtleties of situations such as Israel/Gaza, the fallout from mass immigration, the decisions around Brexit, the trans debate, the difference between being a Muslim and an Islamist, the election of Trump, the war in Ukraine, or climate change are lost. You can’t even explore those subtleties in conversation because in doing so you might expose yourself to be on the “wrong” side and that would threaten your position with your friends or work colleagues.

It seems that keeping in with the in-crowd these days involves chucking others out in the most cold and callous way. And it isn’t just in student life, this is true in business too, where the smallest misspeak can get you sent to HR, even if your intention was not to do any harm.  The grownups are just as bad – statements like “I’ll never have a cup of tea with a Tory” or “I won’t talk to a Brexiteer” are common and are intended to close down discussion.

Recently it was reported in The Guardian of 25 November that Professor Dorothy Bishop, Emeritus Professor of developmental neuro-psychology has resigned from the Royal Society because of Elon Musk’s fellowship.  She has been quoted as saying “I am not going to be polite and nice to Elon Musk, so I can’t keep the code of conduct.”  But why can she not be polite to him?  She may disagree with him but surely she could have an interesting conversation with him to discuss their differences?  Similarly, Bishop Helen-Ann Hartley, who recently called for the resignation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, says she has since met a “wall of silence” from her fellow Bishops, effectively sending her to Coventry for her action.  Again, why can’t people have reasoned debate and discussion and learn from one another’s differences instead of just deciding, without deeper investigation, that someone is a bad person for something they have said or done. We may disagree but that doesn’t make them a bad person.

All this adds up to a judgemental and unforgiving period of history that is stifling freedom of speech, creativity and relationships.  It is making people nervous to open their mouths for fear of alienation or being misunderstood.  It is not a good place for a society to end up.  We have too many examples through history of how populations have been silenced to the detriment of the majority.

If being “kind” is really something of an aim, then that takes being rather more curious as to WHY people have that opinion because very often you discover they are not so different in their principles and aims. However, if you can’t be bothered to understand the background or intentions that underlay their views you will never arrive at a meeting point. I have a friend who has a very different view of Assisted Dying to my own, but I fully respect his opinion and remain fond of him as a friend. Why shouldn’t I? The whole point of ‘diversity’ was to listen to others different to ourselves, wasn’t it?

Is it not time to slow down, stop judging and pointing fingers but instead ask questions? Teachers told us not to tell tales, bully or isolate friends.  Let’s remember some of those playground messages. We will never learn anything if we silence opposite opinions.  The adage “I may not agree with your opinion but I respect your right to express it” needs to be lived and acted upon more often if we are to innovate, grow and get along as a society.  Silencing people, dividing or isolating them is anything but kind.

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Nov 26

2024

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Helen Whitten

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A Personal View on Assisted Dying

Assisted dying ignores “what it is to be human” a member of the Church of England wrote recently, but who is to decide what it is “to be human”?  For them it is presumably a spiritual matter but for others it could just be based on the biology of the human body and its frailties. 

Similarly, a self-appointed “progressive” wrote that people “ought to” end their lives by making the most of their last months. But who are they to tell others what they ought to do, especially if that person has no capacity to make the most of their life? The same writer also stated that, with this bill, a person might be put under pressure to end their life in the “wrong” way.  But who is someone to tell another person what is or isn’t the wrong or right way to spend their last days?

It seems we are being expected to abide by another person’s God or belief system in this.  At a point in time in history it was declared that a life was the gift of God but there can be no concrete evidence of this, only faith.  I believe in the sacredness of life but that does not extend to prolonging it beyond what is tolerable for the individual, plus there are many people who don’t believe in this particular God, or any God, or have other beliefs, but have been dictated to for centuries by people forcing these regulations on others. 

After all, the established religions were against IVF to create life at first, yet this breakthrough has changed women’s and family’s lives and brought precious children into the world. Watch the new movie Joy for a flavour of this.

Contrarily the CofE seems to have been remarkably quiet on the issue of saying that one’s birth sex was created by God in a specific way.  In fact, Welby, as Archbishop of Canterbury, supported trans ideology being taught in schools, which, on the basis of considering “what it is to be human” seems to be very much on the spectrum of making it an individual choice as to what sex one is, despite being born a particular way.  So, if we can have individual choice over one’s body on changing sex, why can’t we have it on choosing to end our lives?

The NHS already acts as God, as does the Government, by making budgetary and clinical decisions around who will get medication and who will not.  It is already an Excel spreadsheet and postcode lottery. It is certainly possible that the NHS could be as keen to kill us off as our relatives would, potentially by applying the Do Not Resuscitate notices.

The independent Office of Health Economics estimated that around 20 terminally ill people in the UK die in unrelieved pain each day.  Also, fewer than 5% of terminally ill people in England who needed hospice care received it in 2023.  It isn’t always possible to alleviate all pain, and many doctors know how miserable that can be. It may be distressing to assist a death, but it is also distressing for staff not to be able to help a patient be free of pain.   

Two-thirds of the UK population want to go ahead with some form of assisted dying, and it is telling that many of them are in the over-65 age-bracket.  In other words, closer to death than some of the people who are dictating the law to us. In the conversations I have had with my peer group, most of us are anxious about the end of our lives.  Most of us want to exit this world with dignity.  Most of the friends I have spoken to say we would choose to die rather than linger in some care home or NHS ward in some state of pain or distress.  We might well choose to go a little earlier but leave this world with dignity, for our own sake as much as that of our families.

What is stopping us are old belief systems that belong to another era, to religions other than our own, other beliefs than our own.  And fear – the endless fear of “the slippery slope” that people will feel they are a burden.  Yes, they might but parents make sacrifices for their children all the time and I hear often that elderly relatives say that their life has become unbearable and that they want to die but can’t. And, as I wrote above, my main fear is whether I have sufficient money to pay for a care home and/or whether I shall die in pain or without dignity. 

Personally, I don’t think it should be the general doctor or hospital ward that supervises these cases.  I believe it should be the Palliative Care system that already deals with compassionate ways of looking after people in their last days.  I have seen people write that we should improve the Palliative Care system rather than approve the Assisted Dying bill.  I believe we should do both and have specialist teams who oversee the terminally ill and ensure their death is as peaceful as possible.

The likelihood of being able to get a High Court Judge to approve these cases is surely only going to lead to more distress and delay, as the courts can’t even bring rape or assault cases to court for years on end.  How can a High Court Judge add anything to the equation, or more than two objective doctors, the person themselves and their families?  What evidence will they be able to analyse, and how? If there is a dispute, obviously the law will need to be actively involved.  Otherwise, I don’t see that involving a Judge brings anything other than more delay and complexity to an already complex event.

In this country we have to effectively starve ourselves to death if we wish to die and, unless we are in a position to be cared for, that can be painful and distressing for all involved.  The alternative is to go to Dignitas, but why should we be forced to travel to another country and potentially put any relative or friend who accompanies us at risk of being accused of being an accomplice?

If we allowed an animal to be in the pain or distress that we allow humans to be, we would be reported to the RSPCA for cruelty.  It seems to me outrageous that I can give my cat a more dignified and peaceful death than I can expect to have myself.  This isn’t murder.  This is a choice personally made about one’s own life, one’s own body. Why should the state or another person have the right to choose what I do with my body if I am not threatening anyone else or putting anyone else at risk?

Of course, safeguards need to be put in place, and I think we need to be very careful when it comes to disability and also mental illness. I have personal experience of those who were mentally ill and suicidal but came out of it and lived happy lives for many decades afterwards.  I am horrified by the posters placed on the tube by Sadiq Khan and TfL apparently of young people celebrating suicide.  This is not what this bill is about.  It is a serious piece of legislation intended to put some people, not all, and only by personal choice, out of their misery as they approach the end of their lives.

There are moments when the world and its possibilities change and, yes, we need to learn from all the mistakes and breakthroughs other nations have made in this complicated subject.  IVF was a compassionate breakthrough and so, I believe, can assisted dying be.  To help someone die peacefully and out of pain can also be a compassionate breakthrough.

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Nov 18

2024

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Helen Whitten

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It’s Time to give Work a Better Press

“You’ll never lie on your deathbed wishing you had spent more time at work.”  That’s how the saying goes and is repeated by many gurus.  Of course it has a point, in that family and friends and other aspects of life are important and should not be neglected.  But when I look back over my lifetime, I realize that some of my very best moments have been at work. So let’s not put others off the pleasures of the workplace.

There are a huge number of people in the UK who are economically inactive and there appears to be a real problem getting young people into the workplace.  This seems to be due to anxiety and mental health problems.  Have they come to imagine that work is a negative experience?  There is so much press in recent years about people not wanting to go into the office or pushing to work from home – is this the problem?  Does the daily commute and interaction with others actually frighten them, put them off?

They need to be informed of other perspectives, don’t they?  We need to share stories of the fun, creativity, teamwork, belonging and the sense of fulfilment we can receive from work.  A good job done, whatever that job may be, can give a real sense of satisfaction.

At the same time there is a group of over 55s who retired young and now would like to get back into work because they are missing the sense of purpose, the social interaction, the enjoyment of challenge that they used to experience in the workplace.  Perhaps some of this group could talk to the young and persuade them that work is not so bad after all, that sitting around doing nothing is not good for the mind, body or soul.

Some time ago I was Deputy Chair of the Work-Life Balance Trust, and Dame Shirley Conran was Chair.  We worked towards encouraging flexibility in the workplace, job sharing and part-time working.  We didn’t intend, by any stretch, to put people off working. We just thought it would make life easier, especially in families where both parents are working, to allow for some flexibility.

But all that was before Covid, at which point some organisations imagined they could do without their offices and save lots of money, and individual employees took on a semi-hermit role at home behind a Zoom screen, or were simply furloughed.  But none of this really works.  We’re social beings and creativity requires more heads than just one and young staff can’t learn how things are done if they are sitting at home and not watching their bosses and colleagues deal with the everyday aspects of what it takes to achieve results for a business or organisation. And if you avoid work you learn none of these things.

I am not alone in saying that I miss the camaraderie, the teamwork of sitting down with a group of other minds and working out solutions to problems.  I had some of the best times of my life meeting diverse groups of people I would never have met had I not worked, or sat behind a laptop at home. Zoom calls don’t allow for those off-piste moments at the coffee machine where you really get to know a colleague or client and chat about topics you might never have thought about before.

Just think how work educates people not only about the skillset required for the job, the way the organisation works, but also about getting on with diverse types of people, people they may not like but have to find a way to work with.  Think of the social skills and resilience that is developed in these moments and how, when one has survived one’s first presentation, or client pitch, or even just a day at work where one has done a good job, whatever that is, one feels better about oneself, and one’s confidence grows.  Some stress and challenge is essential to our growth and personal development. Sitting alone and working from home, or not working at all, does not broaden the mind with other perspectives or experiences.

There is plenty of evidence of how work is better for us than sitting at home bored or feeling useless.  Work can give us meaning, even if it means doing a good job stacking shelves, sweeping leaves off the road, or cleaning a toilet.  Any work we do has a purpose and meaning and our actions, small or large, can have a beneficial impact on others whether it is being a doctor, managing someone’s money, insuring their risks or cleaning someone’s house.  In a recent article a woman who retired young and regretted it, tried without success to find a job of the managerial calibre of her career but is now happily working as a cleaner and being a dog walker.  Doing something for others is better than doing nothing.  And this is quite apart from the fact that earning money gives us motivation, choice and power over our lives.

We need to do more to help coach young people into the workplace and realize how much fun they could make it.  Similarly, those with mental health problems, prisoners, or those with long-term illnesses are unlikely to find their way to fitness or to take the steps required to enter into the workplace without help.  They need coaching to support them in managing simple things like cvs, budgeting rent and food, preparing for an interview, turning up on time.  Step by step, people can learn to develop the life skills they need to take this leap and realize they can swim and not sink, and that they are missing out on something quite precious.

It may be quite hard to appreciate what I am saying if you are in the middle of life, juggling family and work and difficult bosses or clients, but looking back, as I do, on five stimulating decades of work, I encourage you to seek out the good moments, to appreciate that sitting at home ‘in leisure’ is far less interesting than it might appear, especially if you are likely to have another three decades out of work when you retire.  It can be lonely.  You have fewer choices generally, and certainly financially.

I believe individuals lose out spiritually and personally if they take shelter out of the workplace. And yes, flexible working and homeworking can be helpful but let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater.  The country can’t afford it economically if people don’t go to work but it can also be a personal loss. There’s a big world out there and it can be stimulating, and I am confident that I shall feel very happy, on my deathbed, that I did spend a great deal of my time at work. So let’s give work a better press.

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Oct 22

2024

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Helen Whitten

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Clarity of Purpose and Message is what we need

We all want this government to be successful.  Indeed we need them to be successful in order to provide us with the functioning health, education, justice, policing, defence and all systems that we require to maintain a healthy society. It doesn’t matter what you voted, the reality is that we all desperately need this country to thrive, grow and be harmonious but in order to achieve this we need to receive clear messages and a clear direction from our leaders.  This is true of any leader whether of a country or an organisation. Clarity is key, yet all we have received from this government so far is contradiction.

They give us the message that they are going to hit and punish the “filthy rich” and yet we see these same politicians enjoying the trappings of wealth in freebies of designer clothes, events and spectacles that they themselves have not worked hard to achieve.  They tell us there is no social mobility in this country so they must redistribute wealth and education and yet every one of them and most of those who are ever interviewed on the radio these days have come from poor backgrounds similar to Keir’s endless repetition of being the “son of a toolmaker”.  If there is no social mobility how come so many people are now in positions of power from supposedly poor backgrounds?  Most of those I know who have made money have come from unprivileged backgrounds and done well, so why should they now be punished when they have worked hard, employed others and contributed to this country?

Keir Starmer apparently believes that the fuss made over the freebies is “trivial” which shows how far he gets things wrong.  These things matter.  Those who are hard working people don’t get these freebies.  Indeed they are not allowed to accept so much as a bottle of wine or a meal out in business in case it looks like corruption.  I had to stand up in front of businesspeople every day to present but I couldn’t get any tax reduction for a clothing allowance and don’t like shopping any more than Rachel Reeves does. They want the accoutrements of wealth and success without having worked hard at either or accomplished, as yet, anything. They need to wake up to this message.

They say they are not going to tax working people and yet intend to tax and regulate business to an extent that it is bound to impact those working people they say they are here to protect.  They say they are here for business and yet none of them seems to have much if any experience of setting up a business, putting their investment and hard work into working 24/7 to make it work, employ others and constantly battle the competitive marketplaces of the world. 

They say they are for law and order and have shown themselves to get very tough on those who tweeted after the Southport murders and yet they let out prisoners who have done far worse crimes and allow shoplifting to go pretty much unpunished. Perhaps they see it is as “trivial” to bother to arrest those who have gone into Tesco and stuffed as much as they could under their jacket, as I saw the other day here in Kew, and run out before they could be caught.  Maybe Tesco can afford this but a small independent bookshop in Norwich had £1000 worth of stock stolen recently and that is a great deal of money for a small business.  But I don’t think politicians understand the small stuff and how it impacts people’s everyday lives. They say they will stop the boats and criminal gangs but they don’t seem to realize how deeply entrenched these gangs are now in our society and that those who shoplift are often part of such a gang.  Similarly turning a blind eye to “illegal” immigrants or asylum seekers throws up the question as to whether others decide to turn a blind eye to the word “illegal” in other things, such as stealing.

They say they will protect women and yet in the next breath say they will let transgender men enter women’s changing spaces.  They say we need more homes, yet they treat landlords as if they are all greedy criminals and make it as unattractive as possible for anyone to become one.  They say they are here to protect the elderly and yet take away the annual heating allowance for most and are, it seems, intent on raiding any of us who have managed to save or need our savings in order to raise income for daily living.   

They say they are for free speech and yet we see examples of people being silenced for writing, expressing or tweeting an opinion and they do nothing.  It makes many of us writers extremely nervous about what we share these days.  It’s beginning to feel like the Stasi, and with Starmer saying he believes that government needs to be like a ‘nanny state to protect the public’ – eg with the ban on smoking in pub gardens – it begins to give him the flavour of a potential authoritarian, and that’s unlikely to end well for any of us.

They seem to be, consciously or not I am not sure, following the examples of the Kremlin in using disinformation.  As I mention in my book No Lemons in Moscow, the Russians for sure have an interest in sowing disinformation in their own country and certainly in the West in order to stir up discontent and division.  The last Labour Government were the princes of spin and made it almost an inevitable part of political messaging, to our detriment.

Hannah Arendt wrote “The moment we no longer have a free press, anything can happen. What makes it possible for a totalitarian or any other dictatorship to rule is that people are not informed; how can you have an opinion if you are not informed? If everybody always lies to you, the consequence is not that you believe the lies, but rather that nobody believes anything any longer.”

This government need to do better on clarity. They had months to prepare but they have left the UK population with endless contradiction and confusion in that period.  No leader can expect people to follow them unless those people buy into what they are being told.  You can’t buy into contradiction. I rather fear that they are deliberately making it unclear, knowing we would not like what they were truly intending.

We all need to hold them to account on clarity of purpose, free speech, fair justice and functioning public services, all for the common good. Surely, we all want a successful government of whatever hue.  But I fear that if they don’t clear up this messaging soon we shall all end up, as Arendt says, not believing anything any longer.  That is a dangerous place for us to be, both as individuals and as a country.

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