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Dearest Gentle Reader,
Picture, if you will, a brand-new prime minister striding into the Prime Minister’s Residence to the sound of enthusiastic applause – applause, This Author notes, that had been instructed to begin by a clipboard-wielding official before the door had even opened. Such is the theatre of power. One does hope the enthusiasm, at least, was genuine.
Lord Burnham, the fifty-ninth gentleman to occupy that famous address, gave his first major interview this Monday, and what an interview it was. The National Health Society, he declared with considerable urgency, will “collapse” if social care is not reformed. A timeline for said reform? Alas, he “could not put a timeline on it right here, right now.” This Author has heard more precise schedules from a man hailing a hackney carriage in the rain. Lord Burnham first proposed a universal social care system all the way back in 2009, when he served as health secretary under Lord Brown. Seventeen years later, the vision persists. One admires the stamina.
Meanwhile, Baroness Casey and her independent review are being hurried along, with Lord Burnham demanding her conclusions rather sooner than the original 2028 target. When the prime minister begins chivvying an independent commission as one chivvies a tardy dressmaker, you may be certain things are, as they say, urgent. Lady Badenoch, the Conservative leader, has written to warn against tax rises or increased borrowing to fund the whole enterprise. One awaits Lord Burnham’s reply with the customary mixture of hope and resignation.
For those who wished to observe Lord Burnham at even closer quarters, the Broadcasting Society was graciously permitted behind the scenes at three pivotal moments of his first week – including the instant he crossed the threshold of the Prime Minister’s Residence. The T-shirt and bomber jacket, this Author is pleased to report, did not accompany him through the famous black door. The buttoned-up suit prevailed. Progress, of a sartorial sort at least.
From matters of governance to matters of the gravest personal horror. Robert Bush, a former funeral director in Hull, appeared at court today for sentencing having previously admitted sixty-seven offences – among them thirty counts of preventing a lawful and decent burial. Police discovered the body of one Peter Moody, aged sixty-five, at Bush’s premises in March 2024, three months after the family believed him interred. He was found alongside thirty-four others, and more than one hundred sets of ashes. Peter Moody’s daughter described the ordeal as having “crucified” her, and This Author sets down her pen for a moment, because there are stories that resist all wit. That a family who entrusted their beloved to a professional’s care should endure such a betrayal is, in the plainest terms, unconscionable. One hopes the sentencing today brings what small measure of peace the law is able to offer.
To lighter, if no less important, concerns. The Southern Kingdom’s driest regions, it appears, have been entirely snubbed by the weekend’s rains, which confined their attentions to the north and west like guests who confine all conversation to one end of the table. Parts of the Principality have now officially entered drought status. Parts of southern, central and eastern England remain in what the Crown Health Security Agency charmingly terms “prolonged dry weather” – the final stage before drought is formally declared. Temperatures are forecast to peak at thirty-five degrees Celsius in south-eastern parts on Wednesday. Heat health alerts have been issued from Tuesday morning through Friday. This Author, who regards anything above twenty-two degrees as a personal affront, sends her sympathy to the vulnerable, and her firmest advice to everyone else: stay indoors, hydrate, and on no account attempt anything ambitious on Wednesday.
And finally, a dispatch of unexpected delight. Girlguiding has unveiled the first complete redesign of its uniform range since 1990 – thirty-six years during which, presumably, the Brownies managed perfectly well without hidden waistband pockets or gilets that double as pillows. The new range comprises thirty items of clothing and fifteen accessories, with prices beginning at a very democratic twelve pounds for a T-shirt. Seven-year-old Brownie Poppy, interviewed on the Broadcasting Society’s Morning Programme, declared her primary requirement to be “loads of pockets” – a sentiment with which This Author finds herself in complete and unironic agreement. Badge sashes that double as cross-body bags! Thumb holes! Secret pockets! If the young ladies of the Kingdom are this well-organised at seven, the rest of society had better look to itself.
I am, as ever, your most devoted observer – Lady Whistledown.