Politicians are not hypocrites

Saatchi: 'Politicians are like nappies. They need to be changed often, and pretty much for the same reasons'

12 April 2012

If only they were. Hypocrisy would mean they understood truthfulness, or even considered the possibility of sincerity. Before you can be a hypocrite, first you must have genuine beliefs that you can betray.

Ever since our agency created “Labour isn’t working” people occasionally enquire how deeply held are my Tory beliefs.

I also, once, threw myself into the Health Department Anti-Smoking campaign, visited emphysema wards, studied pictures of cancerous lungs, and came up with the grisliest copy I could — puffing away happily as I wrote. How sweet of people to think that advertising copy is written from the heart.

Leaders I like are “conviction” politicians. So even someone like Ken Livingstone commands attention because he is prepared to stand firmly behind his point of view, however disingenuous the approach, however crackpot the cause, however suspect his motivation.

I obviously feel drawn to politicians who hold forthright views and are man enough to fight for them — even if their name isn’t Winston Churchill but Margaret Thatcher, Golda Meir, Angela Merkel.

In general, politicians always try to avoid giving offence by sitting on it.

The usual breed who are hungry for power seem to feel it’s best to say little of consequence and can barely land a good blow on a bereft incumbent, relying instead on voters’ inertia.

The great ally of dozy, third-rate oppositions-in-waiting is the ennui of a jaded public who think “It’s Time For A Change”.

I am never sure whether having governments enjoy a fixed term of four or five years is too long or too short.

In essence, politicians are like nappies. They need to be changed often, and pretty much for the same reasons. Nearly all political leaders don’t seem to have adequate answers, until they write their memoirs.

Don’t you enjoy elections, however? The air is full of speeches, and vice versa.

The Left think they are where the righteous should be. The Right try so hard to scramble left, the damp middle ground has become an overcrowded swamp.

Together when they see light at the end of the tunnel, they spend as much as possible to build some more tunnel.

And why wait for the recession to implode to begin organising our national finances more effectively?

When did Noah build his ark? Before the flood.

Our problem is, we all grew up to hear that anyone could become President or Prime Minister; and now we believe it.

No one comes closer to capturing the workings of government than Claud Schuster, who after taking office in 1915 served 10 different Chancellors during his 29 years as Britain’s senior civil servant.

His description of the relationship between the Prime Minister and the Cabinet was graphic: “Like the procreation of eels, it is slippery and mysterious.”

As someone with a particularly small moral compass, demonstrated by the speed with which I dropped the Health Department anti-smoking campaign the moment we were offered the Benson & Hedges/Silk Cut cigarettes account, I would have made an outstanding Member of Parliament. With a limited skill base, minimal intelligence, and very little numeracy, I obviously stood an excellent chance of achieving high office and acclaim in politics.

Or perhaps a senior post in the diplomatic service? Diplomacy is simple stuff; it’s the art of letting someone have your way. And remembering to say “Good Doggy” while looking for a bigger stick.

In politics, as in business, it’s easy to identify what turns people into high achievers.

There are two rules for success.

1. Never tell everything you know.

However, whatever political hue you may be, all decent people want the safety net that the public sector provides for the less fortunate.

But help me understand why in a little country like ours, the National Health Service is the third largest employer in the world, after the Red Army in China and the railways in India?

I find it harder still to comprehend how the world’s 200 biggest companies manage to contribute 30 per cent of the world’s economy, yet do so employing just one per cent of the world’s workers. Do top international businesses more readily grasp how to manage themselves, than the world’s top politicians know how to manage us?

I have no answer, because I couldn’t possibly get my head around the logistics. But neither, apparently, have successive governments.

Telling someone they are on a seven-month waiting list for a knee operation on a limb that is very painful, the owner of which cannot afford to go private, is the equivalent of saying “Get rich or walk with a stick”.