May 31st, 2022.
Interesting facts were released in the UK today as we prepare for the stupendous Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. There are 16,000 street parties planned for Sunday 5 June. Hundreds of thousands of informal street lunches and picnics are scheduled (no, I don’t know the difference either). To mark the Platinum Jubilee, an extra bank holiday has been granted. To create the four-day weekend, the late May bank holiday will be moved to June 2nd and an additional one-off bank holiday will be created on June 3rd to allow for a continuation of the celebrations. Combined with school half term you can guarantee a week of low productivity and hordes of tourists pouring over the border into Cornwall.
In our little village, there is a full programme of events for the Jubilee weekend.
The forecast is for good weather, so everyone is braced for the influx of tourists which is a godsend for the small businesses, especially those in the hospitality industry. The locals are being pragmatic and putting up with the inconvenience, realising that the county needs the tourists. They have rationalised by deciding to participate fully, “as it’s for the Queen”.
The biggest battle has been the fight with the bureaucracy to get the appropriate permits, including getting permission to hang bunting from the lamp posts. One local council in the Home Counties required applicants to complete 37 pages of forms in order to hold a street party, including a full health and safety assessment and a terrorism appraisal. This is in strong contrast to the national mood and has resulted in a swift pushback from central government in London telling the council not to be so stupid.
Our local body’s approach is typically Cornish. They need to ban parking by the reserve to ensure access for the entertainers and the food stalls, but this needs a Traffic Management Order (TMO) which can take weeks, so they just put cones down with a notice asking people not to park. Surprisingly, people co-operate, and any outsiders that don’t are always persuaded to comply.
Today saw the councillors helping to erect tents and marquees, and position porta-loos. Entrance to the festivities is free and we are expecting a bumper turnout. One of the attractions is the street food available, my favourite being the Thai food stall.
There is an atmosphere of normality returning to the village, and Covid seems such a distance away. There is no requirement for jabs, tests, masks, or anything else needed to be done to allow entrance. It is dangerously close to being normal, and once people have experienced this then it would be difficult for either the government or the council to re-impose a lockdown of any description. It was sheer joy to see the people preparing the site mingling, hugging, laughing, shouting, arguing, and expressing the whole range of normal human emotion.
As I enjoyed the return to ordinariness I began to think about New Zealand and the national mood promoted by our princess of fun and frivolity. Every time I read about New Zealand, I see more signs of division and, instead of a celebration of diversity, I see an accentuation of hate and greed. I have mentioned before the rise of ethnic entrepreneurship in New Zealand – not the business use of entrepreneurship but the academic definition used in peace and conflict studies. This is becoming increasingly dangerous.
Finally, an interesting couple of statistics. In apartheid South Africa (1977) the white population was 16.4% of the total population of South Africa. In 1980 John Minto was the national chairman of HART and supported more rights for the other 83.6%. As of 30 June 2021 17.1% of New Zealand’s population was Maori. Who will protect the rights of the other 82.9%?
FOOTNOTE: I see the increasing use of Aotearoa New Zealand on official documents. Who sanctioned this and why? And why can’t we call the country New Zealand Aotearoa?