• Immigrants

This is, of course, assuming that we can do anything about it. Despite being a (theoretically) well-organised and (apparently) rich state situated (unquestionably) on an island, we seem to be incapable of preventing thousands of people a year from coming here on small boats.

The world is an increasingly wild place and our laws count for less than the promises that are made by people trafficers to an ever-increasing number of desperate people. The UK, for all its problems, is not a bad place to live. The fact that I’m sitting here typing pretty much what I want without the secret police bursting the door down seems proof enough.

Net migration by all methods is, according to the same source (The Migration Observatory), “broadly similar…compared to other high-income countries, on average, over the past few decades”. The website adds that “Net migration is expected to fall from current levels in 2025 onwards, although the future outlook is highly uncertain.”

Well, indeed. People will do what they can to move to a place which can offer them a better life, or to respond to demand for their services. The care industry is a good example. The King’s Fund suggests that there are about 130,000 vacancies in this sector, a figure which is only likely to grow. The Week quotes The Guardian as claiming that there are about nine million economically inactive people in their UK. “Will [they] UK fill the vacancies in the care sector? Time will tell.”

I’m not quite clear what the government’s plans are intended to accomplish: achieving an election pledge, supporting industries that rely on foreign workers, stimulating the economy or propitiating Reform.

• Drugs

Few things better sum up the insidious power of the internet than the “story” of the Englishman, the Frenchman and the German taking drugs on a train. The three men were, of course, the leaders of their countries. The drug was allegedly a bag of cocaine but looks more like a tissue. Alex Jones, the full-time conspiracy theorist, stoked up the drugs theory with a series of “exclusive” posts.

On one level, who can blame him: his post has been viewed about 30 million times. I imagine this has provided him with income, something he needs after his spate of unfavourable court judgements.

It also provides validation. After all, if 30 million watch or read something then, on one level, it has to be kind of true (and makes the author feel important). If something’s repeated often enough, and we read and even briefly accept it, it gets a finger-hold in our brain, even if it’s later proved to be batshit. There are probably a lot of people in the USA and elsewhere who’d love to believe that this were true.

It must be admitted that there’s something amusing about three world leaders taking coke on a train. It’s certainly a more interesting transgression than the dreary tales of deceit and corruption with which politicians are normally saddled.

It’s also the perfect narcotic for a leader as it gives you, for about half an hour after taking it, the feeling that you’re omnipotent. A world war can be started in less time and for just this reason.

Speed is a more brutal and hectic drug, so perhaps also suitable for politicos. If they were on weed then probably nothing would ever get done; just hours of sitting around eating chocolate digestive biscuits, so perhaps not that different from what actually happens.

The thought of Kier Starmer on acid, though, is particularly alarming. The vision now floats up before me of his standing up in the Commons introducing a bill to round up all the four-dimensional green elephants that are living in the clouds above his house. Perhaps, on reflection, they should stick to coke.

We also like the idea of people in the public eye having failings, the more so when this is unexpected. It makes us able to hate them and like them, and have both contempt and sneaking respect for them, all at the same time.

“Obviously, everyone in the country takes drugs,” a friend of mine said, apropos of nothing, one day many decades ago. I asked what she meant. “Well,” she replied, “if the captain of the England cricket team does” – Ian Botham had recently been caught having a spliff round the back of the Somerset changing room – “then so must everyone else.”

I saw what she meant. For some time after that, every time I saw Botham hit a six (which happened quite often) I said to myself “what a shot – and he’s probably off his face as well.”

• Cashing in

During another conversation, also years ago, another friend (yes, I have more than one) observed that there are two kinds of countries: the ones where you need to be rich to go into politics, and the ones where you go into politics to get rich. The USA seems to be both of these.

This article in The Week, quoting The Observer, claims that Trump’s personal fortune has more than doubled (to over $5bn) in the last year, “thanks to his crypto, media and real-estate ventures.” His family are not shy to get involved either, sometimes acting as the “advance guard” and doing lucrative Bitcoin or property deals before the arrival of the Big Man.

Never mind drugs on trains – an effete and decadent crime, just what you’d expect from those pesky Europeans: this is what we really expect of our political leaders. Graft comes in many forms. Fiddling expenses and betting on the timing of an election suddenly seem almost pathetically unimportant. As with so many things, Trump has taken excess to levels no one else could even contemplate. He’s also making no secret of it.

In the process, he’s done a huge favour to dodgy or potentially dodgy politicians all over the world. Just like the captain of the England cricket team smoking a joint, if the president of the USA is behaving like that then it must be OK for us, too.

• Fuel

From the moment it got elected, this government has been keen to show that it’s even more right-wing than the Conservatives. True, it didn’t re-introduce capital punishment or make fox-hunting compulsory, though these may come.

The method it chose to show its mettle was was to reduce the number of people who would receive winter fuel payments. This was estimated to save £1.3bn a year. Forgive my cynicism, but a good rule of thumb to apply to government announcements is that any project will cost three times as much as forecast and that any saving, no matter how large, will actually produce no saving at all.

This cut became an article of faith for Starmer & Co. Then, after the recent local election results, which were pretty dismal for Labour, the PM has been forced into a U-turn. You have to pick your battles carefully. This one made the government seem first nasty, then weak.

The Guardian looks at this story here, pointing out that it’s unclear whether this will apply from this year and exactly how many people will be affected. It also suggests that this might signal further changes of policy regarding benefits.

One matter which it surely can’t leave unattended for too much longer is the rocketing cost of social care and SEND funding for children. These are conveniently at arms length as they’re looked after by local councils. As some of these are better at running their affairs than others, any financial collapses can be blamed on municipal incompetence rather than government parsimony. However, the current situation is untenable and is driving even well-run authorities to the wall.

The SEND costs are particularly insidious as they exist in a kind of accounting no man’s land, not on the the council’s books but not really on the government’s either. Hopefully the local-government reorganisation will provide the means and the opportunity to sort this colossal muddle.

• And finally…

• The new Pope is only just getting used to his new robes and rings but pressure is already building on him to deal with the festering long-running abuse scandal which has dogged the Roman Catholic church – and, to be fair, pretty much all the rest of them – for decades. This CNN article takes a look at his predecessor’s patchy record on this matter and suggests some of the things that Leo will need to do.

• Returning to the question of the accuracy, or otherwise, of what you see on social media, Full Fact reports that “footage circulating on social media with claims it shows Pakistan shooting down an Indian fighter jet is actually from a video game.”

• Back to Trump again – sorry about that but he seems to be everywhere. As well as making money (see above), PotUS seems to enjoy picking fights with other leaders during their visits to the White House. A few months ago, a surprised Zelensky got quite a mauling in front of the cameras. Next up was South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa, who fared rather better when ambushed over claims that his government had been persecuting white citizens. White South Africans are not at the top of most lists of people we tend to feel sorry for, I doubt that Trump’s outburst would have done much to change that.

• There was a major victory in the High Court this week for those who want to engage in wild camping on Dartmoor, This was at the expense of another group of people on whom sympathy is not normally, lavished: hedge-fund managers who buy up swathes of the countryside. This BBC article adds a bit more context to the story and includes some advice for the park authority about how campers should conduct themselves.

• For a long time I’ve been a fan of Wordle but have since discovered two even better variants, Quordle and Octordle in which you have to find four or eight five-letter words. A different technique is called for than with the single-word original. Each is in their own way completely engrossing. Thank goodness they only let you do one of each a day otherwise I’d never get anything else done. Beware, however: the games are written by Americans and so spellings like “donut” and “color” crop up.

• The Europa League final, which I didn’t watch live, was by all accounts a fairly dour game in which, during the second hall, Spurs displayed some heroic defending, akin to that shown by their north London rivals Arsenal when winning their only European trophy, the 1994 Cup Winners Cup. You can click here to read the thoughts of my son Michael on the match and on Spurs generally.

“What next for Man Utd?” a comment on the BBC website said after the match. “A poor squad, a manager whose tactics don’t suit the players at his disposal, a terrible Premier League season, and no European football next year. Worrying times for the club.” Some of you might care: but I don’t…

Across the area