A much-needed antidote to political despair

This is a really good, well-thought-out statement of the case for collective political action in the UK, with just enough rant in it (conveyed well by the narrator) to qualify as impassioned without being whiny or hectoring or any of the other things a book like this could be. Listen to it now, before you cast your vote.

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Clarion call to the despairing!

This is a brilliant book. If, like me, you have become despairing of the awfulness of the way we run the world, and our country in particular, this is a book to cause you to take heart big time. Williams is brilliant at putting a common sense finger on the kinds of idiocies that allow us to continue to support a world run by financiers who make shedloads of money without apparently the smallest interest in social or political questions like: why are so many people using food banks? And how do you get enough money (this morning's Today programme suggested something like 34k) to put a deposit on a modest home in the suburbs? This in the much vaunted 5th richest country in the world. They said so, didn't they? In the referendum. And could not understand why so many didn't rush to vote us into fourth or third place . . . Perhaps the least discussed question around the result was the 30% who did not vote at all. Who had apparently either given up on politics, or never saw it as a useful way to spend time before.

Williams surveys with ruthless clarity the way that public money has been chucked at ideologically-fuelled projects that cost the earth and delivered zero. The way that public discourse has been turned skilfully against the idea that public ownership is bound to be 'inefficient' and 'bureaucratic' - while private sector failures and lack of dedication to the real task they were paid for makes few headlines. ('Bureaucratic' is itself a brilliant word for implying that life in public administration consists of long coffee breaks, and polite conversations about the children in the canteen). If you really want somebody to collect those taxes from Google et al, who do you think is going to do it? Little green men from Mars?

Williams is not a rightie, as you may guess, and neither am I. I am not a revolutionary socialist either. I would probably answer to social democrat if really pressed, but I liked this book. She doesn't try to persuade us of some party ideology, or against another. She just points out, with razor sharp wit, the reality of the way we live now and take it all for granted . . .

I also like very much the way she is able to spot the underlying unrealism, combined with pessimism, that governs so much political thinking. We can't do that because . . . . It won't won't work because . . . . Even when lots of less rich countries round the world can and are doing . . . .We are stuck in many hidebound ways of thinking that we need to shed, and soon - before the planet goes the same way as the referendum!

Williams' prescription is activism - not the sort that hangs about outside Jeremy Corbyn rallies waving banners and waiting for their leader to speak, but joins some organisation, and gets involved. The former is the type of 'activism' that achieves not much apart from headlines. There are local people brainstorming good ideas near you, campaigning for a better world, in some area that will suit and hold your interest for sure. Go find them. It's not whether Jeremy can deliver that we need to focus on, but on the immediate things under our nose that we can deliver. This is Williams' message, and I for one found it refreshing. Ok, your Party may deliver by 2020 (and then again it may not.) The real question is, what are we going to do meanwhile?

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It's not a story it is reality for millions

I'm awake at last to the scandal of how we treat our own people. One nation? Read on

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Insightful and provoking.

Zoe poses a number of questions that too may are afraid to ask. Well balanced and insightful summary of the UK today.

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A long moan

This is neither detailed study nor inspiring. Just cherry picked gloom. I probably would agree with a lot of what she says but every listen leaves you miserable.

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