“Cable demands end to all-white boardrooms” appears above a short article relegated to Page 20 of The Sunday Times.
Evidently the editors didn’t attach much importance to the story. That is a most unfortunate oversight, and one I’d like to correct.
“Diversity must now be tackled in its broadest sense,” decreed Comrade Vince, adding that boardrooms reflecting ‘modern Britain’ would give the country a competitive advantage.
Hence the dispelled illusions, such as:
Illusion 1: This is still a free country.
Used in the political, rather than metaphysical, sense, freedom means, among other things, that the state doesn’t dictate to private companies how they should run their business.
Corporatism therefore is the antithesis of freedom, which isn’t merely a theoretical postulate.
The state dictating to businesses whom to hire, whom to fire, whom to promote, what and how much to produce, how much to pay their employees and to charge for their products is a feature of socialism overlapping with fascism.
Nazi Germany, fascist Italy and Hollande’s France should have given this practice a bad name, but not as far as my friend Vince is concerned.
Note the modality of his remarks, defined by the use of such words as ‘demand’ and ‘must’. The state adopting this tone of voice in its dialogue with businesses either has already overstepped the line where socialism ends and fascism begins, or is desperate to do so.
Illusion 2: This is still an intelligent nation.
Vince and his Parteigenossen talk to us as if we were stupid. Yet these days politicians don’t utter a word without checking the focus groups first. Hence Vince’s research must have told him that we are indeed stupid.
Otherwise we’d know that the purpose of a board of directors is to run a profitable business, not to reflect the demographic make-up of the nation and pander to every idiotic perversion modernity serves up.
To that end it should elevate to management only those fit to manage, regardless of any other characteristics. If a one-legged black Muslim lesbian is a talented manager, she should climb up to the highest rung of the corporate ladder. If not, she shouldn’t.
Moreover, to say that Vince’s mandated rainbow boards running all our major companies would give us a ‘competitive advantage’ is to assume we aren’t just stupid but retarded as well.
The more restrictive the labour practices the less competitive the economy – to this simple rule there are no known exceptions. When the state rules by economic diktat, free enterprise is guaranteed to become neither, and the economy will inevitably find itself in the doldrums.
If you want empirical proof, just compare France’s economy, with its insanely suffocating red tape, with those of les Anglo-Saxons. Having done that, ponder why London has become the world’s fifth largest French city, and why the French who have moved here represent the most economically virile stratum of the country’s population.
If we follow France’s business practices, we won’t be like France, with her still reasonably well-educated labour force. We’ll be like Greece – and Vince either doesn’t realise this or is certain we don’t. In either case, this isn’t something he cares about.
Illusion 3: One day we won’t be governed by wicked, power-hungry mediocrities.
Vince and his ilk are clearly confident of their electoral immunity. ‘Ilk’ is a collective noun, and what I mean by it is our governing elite, regardless of their party affiliation.
The elite has become smugly homogeneous, and you can bet your house that no one in the other parties will take Vince to task over this unmitigated longing for fascism. To do so would mean going against the ethos they themselves have so assiduously cultivated.
The stratagem has worked: vast blocs of voters have been brought up to think that corporatism means economic liberty, burgeoning state control over every aspect of our lives is freedom, and all those Daves, Eds, Nicks and Vinces really do know how to govern a great country.
Hence they can be sure that their hold on power won’t be challenged. How they distribute portfolios among themselves matters to them much less than the fact that they’ll have the power to distribute them.
It’s pointless to wonder how far they are prepared to go to keep this status quo. As far as it takes, is the short answer.
Extending the vote to 16-year-olds? Fine. This lot would have babies vote before they can walk, if that’ll keep them in power.
Admitting Turkey to the EU, thereby giving 77 million Muslims an automatic right to settle in Britain? Perfect, especially if private companies can be forced to staff their boards with the new arrivals.
And if you still have illusions about any of this, trust Vince to explain what’s what. Wittingly or unwittingly.
My new book, Democracy as a Neocon Trick, is available from Amazon and the more discerning bookshops. However, my publisher would rather you ordered it from http://www.roperpenberthy.co.uk/index.php/browse-books/political/democracy-as-a-neocon-trick.html or, in the USA, http://www.newwinebookshop.com/Books/0002752