The Crown: A right royal triumph for Netflix

There's a near endless stream of hype surrounding TV these days. So much so that I find it all a bit 'cry wolf'. How can you know which series' really are the 'real deal' and which ones are just pretending to be?

It's perhaps for this reason that I've long lagged behind the modern world and resisted Netflix. I don't watch enough telly to justify getting it. Yet when we recently succumbed and signed up for the streaming service, The Crown was one of the shows on our hitlist. Much had been made of Peter Morgan' expensive royal series and the reviews had been pretty positive. Luckily, it turned out that this was one of the shows that justifies the hype.

Duty calls. #TheCrown. Now streaming on Netflix. pic.twitter.com/MIdHOeJCym

— The Crown (@TheCrownNetflix) November 4, 2016

The first thing to note is the casting and the performances of the key lead roles. Claire Foy is fantastic as The Queen, embracing a role in which she carries the burden of the monarchy on her shoulders in an uncertain world.

We've probably all heard (or even attempted) enough impressions of Her Maj over the years and it'd be easy to have gone with an out-and-out impression of the long-serving monarch. Foy, however, resists this. She captures the right 'voice' and look without straying in caricature. The whole drama rests on the casting, writing and performance of this role - the fact I enjoyed it so much suggests that they got all three aspects just right.

Similar could be said for Matt Smith's Philip. I was surprised to see the former Doctor Who bag this role, but he was able to portray a subtle blend of mischief and frustration that brought the character to life.

In fact, the only role I was disappointed with was John Lithgow's Churchill. If there's one historical character we've seen impressions of more than the Queen then it's Winston and I felt this representation nudged too much toward the stereotype at times. It must've been a hard ask for a New York born actor to handle such a role. It's not awful, it's just noticeably not as good as the rest of the show.

One thing that helps all of the characters is the format of the first series. In 10 episodes, barring flashbacks, we cover the period from Elizabeth and Philip's marriage in 1947 through to the mid 1950s. While there is much ground to cover here, the length of time gives plenty of breathing space for the characters to be fleshed out. There are many dramas and films to have covered this ground before, but it's unlikely that any will have been able to do so with such depth or style.

Speaking of style, it's clear to see that the show's much-vaunted £100 million budget has been put to good use. The episodes are beautifully shot, without exception. The money hasn't gone on flashy effects, it's gone on getting all of the important things right. Looks alone should alert you to the fact that this is something special.

The substance more than matches the style, though. I was also impressed by the way in which writer Peter Morgan knitted the Queen's personal and family drama in with events in the world around her. Churchill political demise, Suez and the smog, intertwine with the abdication, Margaret's relationship and Philip's frustrations. We see how external and internal matters go on to shape the sort of monarch the Queen was to become with lessons on leadership, service and duty laced throughout all ten episodes. We also see a history of Britain through the eyes of the royal family. There's absolutely no need to be a royalist or a history buff to savour this.

None of the characters is a 2D representation of their real-world counterpart. There are things to  admire, respect and understand in most of the protagonists but we're also shown their flaws. I was perhaps only wholly sympathetic with the Queen (goodie two shoes-ness aside) and her father. Philip's petulance, Edward's money-grabbing, Churchill and Eden's politicking, the Queen Mother's scheming and, above all else, the resistance of those in the royal household to change all made for an array of actors who, for various reasons, made life complicated for the young monarch.

All in all, The Crown is a big triumph for Netflix. You feel there will be a bucket load of awards heading its way and you wouldn't begrudge that either. Roll on series two.

What to make of Donald Trump's victory?

Photo: Unsplash

I heard a discussion the other day about Donald Trump's election victory in which his less vocal supporters were referred to as 'silent Trumpers'. There are many things we can teach our friends from across the Pond about our language, but this will help them learn than one shouldn't judge a Trump by its volume, but the smell it leaves afterwards.

Yes, ok, 'fart gags' probably aren't the most adult way to react to recent events in America. It's the best I've got while we all try to make some sense of it all though. The journalist in me wants to understand it now but the historian in me feels it'll be some years before we can thoroughly and objectively determine what has happened.

At the outset, Donald Trump's victory over Hillary Clinton did feel like it could be one of those 'end of an era' moments. Perhaps it was apt on the day, 27 years earlier, that the Berlin Wall had come down, American voters elected someone who had loudly vowed to put one up. Historians love to split up the past into distinct 'eras', with 1789-1914 often seen as the 'long nineteenth century' for example. You might argue that 1914-1945 and 1945-1989, as the world wars and Cold War, marked two more eras (although historians love nothing more than debating definitions at length), but what if 1989-2016 is another? Only with the benefit of hindsight will we know if globalisation and liberalism were truly threatened by Trump and indeed Brexit.

Trump's campaign - and the words belched from his mouth - has been abhorrent. His comments really shouldn't have made him a suitable man to lead his nation and yet, come January, he'll be in the White House. Did people vote in spite of what he said or because they enjoyed hearing a language alien to political discourse? It was surely a bit of both.

In fact, that has been the problem with much of the coverage so far. Too many people have been too absolute in their analysis. Was it really a huge anti-establishment revolution when more people actually voted for Clinton? Why did so many women back Trump? Would Hillary have been looked upon more favourably if she were a man? If the 'rust belt' is supposedly prepared to support racism then why did it vote for Obama? These questions are more suited to someone more well-versed in American politics but they all point to a more complex and confusing picture with the split between rural and urban and old and young all revealing.

Journalist Gaby Hinsliff probably summed it up best with this tweet

New rule not to read anything starting 'Trump's victory proves...' No one theory fits. Begs as many questions as it answers.

— Gaby Hinsliff (@gabyhinsliff) November 10, 2016

Yet the impact has been felt beyond the world of American politics and has touched on two other areas: journalism and social media.

There's an interesting theory that suggests Trump was only able to stand in the first place because he built up momentum with what he said in TV studios. In an increasingly commercial news environment, Trump is a ratings winner. Controversial performers get bookings and are more likely to have a chance to have their say. I'm not sure how, if at all, that can be fixed. It does, though, show that a certain 'style' is likely to stand out and it's not a style that relies on careful reasoning or evidence.

Then there's the polls. For too long the smallest of movements in one direction or another have become a big story when it comes to politics. The debate then centres on the nip and tuck of the polling horse race, rather than the issues. Hopefully now, with so many of the pollsters being caught out by Trump's victory, Brexit and the last General Election, they will be taken with more than a pinch of salt rather than being  - as the New Statesman's Helen Lewis has said - a sugar fix for news outlets.

Social media is under the spotlight too and at last, it seems, the pressure is on Facebook. In recent years this has grown in importance for news outlets who need to publish to their audience on this platform. Yet, with power comes responsibility, and it's high time that Facebook did much more to combat the fact that fake nonsense is given equal weighting to proper journalism.

There's also been a focus on the danger of 'filter bubbles' - the way in which social media can cause us to only see a selection of views within our own narrow friendship and interest groups. I've written before how I think this isn't healthy when it comes to making us all tolerant of others. You might not agree with people who voted for Trump - I certainly don't - but we need to try to understand why they did (I found Amelia Tait's piece on bursting that filter bubble interesting).

Social media is also too much about the 'great take down' and someone 'shutting down' an argument as well as a near-constant state of outrage at what one person has said or done. Sometimes the outrage only serves to get more coverage for the person.

I can't help thinking that Hillary should've followed Michelle Obama's 'when they go low, we go high' mantra a little more. Rather than always attack Trump for what he said - which was what he thrived on - why not focus on his muddled policy platform? Maybe that was half the problem - there seemed very few positive policies to promote from the Clinton camp and so it became a bitter argument won by the man with the loudest voice.

Social media outrage isn't helping and neither is the growing trend of 'no platforming' people because of their beliefs. It's not easy to know what to do - we can't expect people not to be offended at genuinely offensive comments - but there needs to be stronger, clear-headed approach to defeating people through force of argument on all sides of the political spectrum. By refusing to debate with someone, you hand them a moral victory and the chance to appear unfairly treated.

Finally, much has already been made of the parallels with Brexit. It's a very tempting comparison to make, especially for those of us in the UK . One key area in which they were probably similar was in the strength of the core message for the winning side.

PR expert Mike Hind wrote a superb piece after the EU Referendum about the marketing reasons for the success of the Leave side. (It's here if you haven't seen it) I can't help thinking that Trump's 'Make America Great Again' was, like the Leave message, a simple and strong pitch that earned 'gut instinct' votes and cut through all of the personal mud slinging. I'm increasingly starting to think that these gut instincts decide more votes than long manifestos or detailed policy.

Also, just as Brexit turned a complex debate into a basic black and white choice, the US election turned its country's future into a personality contest between two people. Both votes have posed as many questions as they have answers and have left the electorate hopelessly divided.

So, what next? Either Trump will turn back on his boldest promises and upset the supporters he's whipped up into a frenzy or he'll stay true to his word and be awful. For once, I'm hoping this is a case of a politician who lied.

After that train of thought - almost as incoherent at Trump himself - it's time for a lie down. See you in 25 years for a proper historical look at Trump and Brexit? That's if he hasn't pressed the nuclear button before then I suppose...

What I learned from...Das Reboot

First things first, what a title. I'm a sucker for a good play on words so Raphael Honigstein pretty much had me with the two-word name of this book. Luckily the rest of the text lives up to the promise of the title.

I've always enjoyed Honigstein's coverage for the Guardian and his appearances on James Richardson's Football Weekly podcast. I've also long been a fan of the reinvented German national side and its entertaining journey from loveable hosts in 2006 (the year I first visited the country) to world champions eight years later. This, then, was a too-good-to-miss combination.

Luckily the intelligent insight of Honigstein's journalism shines through in the book as he pieces together the entertaining journey and the reasons behind it.

He neatly sidesteps the temptation to wallow in the glory of the games that led to the final in Brazil, interspersing moments from the victorious 2014 campaign with flashbacks to events from 2004 (and, in cases, before). It's a neat device that subtly shows how the pieces of the puzzle all fitted together and how events in Brazil were the direct culmination of plans put in place and lessons learned over a decade or more.

It's perhaps timely to read Honigstein's book now, at a moment when English football is searching for its umpteenth new dawn and another new manager at the helm of the national side. I couldn't help but come away feeling that England are light years behind Germany. Maybe the FA board all ought to have a leaf through Das Reboot before making their next move.

So, how did they do it? Well, Honigstein offers fascinating detail about the key ways in which German football, to quote the subheader, 'reinvented itself and conquered the world'. We see how new coaches and a new manager embrace new tactics and a fresh approach. We also see the importance of learning lessons from other sports - notably hockey - and a more professional approach to the sport. As Honigstein notes, other jobs had long-carried a need for qualifications, standards and regulations - so why not football? This manifests itself in the form of better academies - graded by strict standards and rewarded financially for meeting them - many more trained coaches and the need for players to be smart off the field as well as on it.

It's a system that produces technically and mentally astute young players who are ready for the Bundesliga and beyond. An interesting contrast with the transfer-obsessed Premier League. The next step, it seems, will be to demand certain standards of the people who take the role of sporting director - something still laughably derided in some circles in this country. German football also learned to wean itself off a soap-opera style form of coverage of games, which carried an obsession of the 'character' of the players and the role of key leaders.

There are also interesting passages on the use of technology. From a bespoke app for the 2014 squad to use to share clips and analysis of themselves and their opponents to a 'Footbonaut' machine that helps players to prepare for the unexpected in the heat of the battle on the field. The latter, it seems, could be seen to have directly contributed to the goal scored by Mario Götze.

Honigstein also looks at the Swabian influence behind the footballing revolution in Germany - from Klinsmann and Löw to Klopp, Tuchel, Ralf Rangnick and beyond - and the way this hard-working, financially successful region with a penchant for problem-solving became so important.

Then, of course, there's the insight to the World Cup campaign itself. From the disastrous pre-tournament camp to the tactical criticism of Löw and the struggles against Ghana and Algeria, its fascinating to see how the squad faced up to setbacks. It's easy for English fans, from the outside, to slip into stereotypes and presume the German football team is a slick, calm operation that doesn't have the same problems that befell 'our boys'. This shows that that is nonsense. Löw's side simply learned from its mistakes and reacted better to the problems it encountered.

Equally fascinating was the reaction to the 7-1 trouncing of Brazil in the semi final. The players almost feel a little guilty at having so comprehensively destroyed the dreams of their hosts. They are also annoyed at conceding a late goal in a game in which, amazingly, they had fewer attempts and fewer shots on target than the Brazil team that they so royally thumped and are desperate to guard against getting carried away after a result in which, frankly, most of us would've been extremely 'carried away'. Still, that's another lesson learned from the past and another mark of what made them worthy world champions.

Returning to England, though, is there really anything here that we should learn? The Germans, after all, won through long term investment, a brave approach and by treating football with the same seriousness as other sectors in the economy. Perhaps, without getting too deep, we should be worried that we don't have an equally successful industrial model to transplant onto football in this country?

Das Reboot is a superbly-written account of a fascinating story. It adds extra detail and insight to familiar events - including chapters in the words of Thomas Hitzlsperger and Arne Friedrich - as well rich new material. It's evey bit as good as the title promises.

Searching for a healthy disagreement

It wouldn't do if we were all the same would it? Or so says the cliché. Yet, while I agree that life would be pretty dull if everyone agreed, I also reckon that we're all in danger of suffering from a lack of variety when it comes to views of the world.

Where has this thought come from? Well, it's something that I've been pondering for a while but was sparked further thanks to an aside in a column by John Harris for the New Statesman. In the piece, about Labour losing its traditional heartland, he wrote of what he called the 'John Peel mistake'. He explained:

Circa 1969, the DJ wondered why one of his favourite albums was not in the charts: “Everyone I know’s got a copy,” he said. Back came the reply: “No – you know everyone who’s got a copy.”

Harris uses it when touching on Corbynites who are struggling to fathom why mass rallies won't necessarily result in electoral success yet, for me, it's a neat idea that helps explain a problem.

Photo: Unsplash

Take the EU referendum, for example. After the vote, many people were shocked by the outcome. How could we possibly have voted out? Often people's Facebook timelines had, in the run-up to June 23, been full of people explaining why they were voting Remain. Yet Facebook just lets us see the views of our family and friends. If everyone you know voted Remain it doesn't mean that everyone wanted to Remain, it was just that you don't know the Outers.

Is that a problem? Maybe not, you might think. You're perfectly entitled to be friends with whoever you want and there's nothing wrong with finding companionship with like-minded people, clearly. But, does this all mean that we understand each other a little less?

It's also a particular problem if we choose to get our news from Facebook. Through social media we're not getting the news, we're getting a biased view of the world based on the likes and interest of us and our friends. It all needs consuming with a hearty dose of salt.

This is one of the ways in which online news needs to improve. An old fashioned print publication contains a whole host of articles. Until I buy and flick through one I don't know what I might find interesting. A print paper tells you about conflicts in far flung lands that you weren't aware of, offers you opinion articles from people you don't agree with and covers themes and topics that you wouldn't list as your 'interests' but are interesting nevertheless. I don't know about you but I find it hard to search out the same breadth online and feel my knowledge and understanding of the world has suffers as a result.

Perhaps I'm lazy and need to search out a better reading experience. It is hard though, especially when you are lead to much of what you read online. The trouble is that people are riddled with contradictions. I obsessively follow football so would, you'd presume, be interested in other sports such as Formula One or rugby. That'd certainly be the assumption if you were selling to me. Yet, as it happens, I don't. I like Doctor Who but wouldn't watch most other sci-fi, I haven't seen half of the 'must see films' that most people my age have watched and I'm a bloke with bugger all interest in flash cars. If I'm lead down any of these seemingly natural paths my attention is lost.

I happen to think we should celebrate the ways in which we are different from the norm, not lazily conform to what we're supposed to like. The music charts have, in one way, been diminished as a by-product of streaming. It's all too easy to listen to the existing top 20/50, meaning that those songs get even more plays and stay where they are. I don't want my news to become a similar 'vanilla' assortment of favourites.

I also think we're in danger of letting all this fuel further intolerance of others. It's dangerous to only surround yourself with those who agree with you as it can easily give you an inflated sense of being right. I've increasingly tried to tell myself that there are very few times in which there is a right or wrong answer in life.

If you are certain you're right, you're less likely to want to even hear the view of someone who disagrees - whether that's on something trivial such as music, film or sport or something such as Brexit.

I'm not sure what the answer to all of this is. I can't help thinking that a little healthy disagreement would be a good start though.

David Copperfield: A delightful Dickens classic

Has anyone else got a book that has been sitting on the shelf looking at them for a long while? In truth I've got several. But chief on the waiting list was David Copperfield. Until now.

A fair few years ago (7 or 8 I think) now I worked my way through the Pickwick Papers (having previously read Hard Times, Oliver Twist and bits of Great Expectations) and loved it. I know it's not seen as one of Dickens' best but I found it funny and really entertaining. I loved the serialised format and the weird and wonderful tangents it explored. I vowed that David Copperfied would be next and then, as usual, failed to meet my reading ambitions.

After a recent cull of the shelves, Copperfield called louder than ever so - despite being a hefty read - he was packed for my holiday and my promise was finally fulfilled.

I'd prepared for a return to a 'classic' by churning through a quick throwaway page turner but needn't have worried about getting back into the Dickens saddle.

Actually I think anyone daunted by taking on a 'classic' should consider, as I did throughout David Copperfield, that the best novels from the past feel no different to a book from the modern day. The reason such books enjoy their lofty status is because their tales stand the test of time. Dickens' observations are surprisingly and refreshingly modern, meaning that it's very rarely a puzzle to pick through the language.

If the Pickwick Papers was something of a jolly jape and Hard Times a political commentary, this was something different entirely with a different strain of observations on the world.

At face value it's the biography of the titular character but there's more than the face value narrative to enjoy here. In fact, for me, the real joy of the story comes from the cast of colourful personalities - the people he encounters throughout his life. From the dependable Traddles, ever-wise Agnes, crazy Aunt, malevolent Murdstones, sycophantic Heep and amusingly verbose Micawbers to the loveable Peggottys, everyone seems well sketched out and provides a pleasure. Dickens deploys a searing sarcastic wit to help to establish each of his characters, making for a merry band of memorable friends and foes along the journey. The backdrop - be it Suffolk, Yarmouth, London or Kent - is also brought to life in a vivid way.

Copperfield himself is, at times, a frustrating character. He latches himself onto the wrong friend in Steerforth and, arguably, the wrong woman in Dora - both times eventually realising the virtues in Traddles and Agnes in their place. He's also a fairly tragic figure - losing his dad, mum and wife along the way in the book's most emotional passages - and is someone who earned my respect by becoming a shorthand parliamentary reporter.

There's fun to be had in attempting to spot which events are inspired by Dickens' own life, and this personal touch must surely add to the richness of the readers' experience. Still, at its heart, this is a tale of relationships - between parent and child, friends, partners, colleagues, enemies - that rests on the people Copperfield comes across.

It was rewarding to finally tick this off my hitlist and pleasing that it didn't disappoint. The next step is to delve back into a meaty non-fiction text and dust off a history book that has been waiting to be plucked from the shelves. Hopefully that ambition won't take so long...

Reviewing The New European

After the ill fated launch of The New Day I think most people, me included, thought we'd seen the last ever launch of a print newspaper but then, out of the blue, came The New European.

The 'pop-up paper for the 48%' from Archant launched last week and I couldn't resist having a nosey at what they'd come up with.

I ordered a copy of issue one (they're being mostly stocked in pro-Remain areas and this neck of the woods is 'Brexit central' so I doubt we'll see one in the shops) but didn't know quite what to expect. Had they had long enough to get it all together? Was £2 a bit steep? Would it all bit of a moan-fest?

Luckily my fears weren't realised and what popped through the letterbox was actually a cracking paper. There's a lot in it, a good range of columnists and a surprising variety of content. Matt Kelly and co deserve an awful lot of praise for doing all of this in such a short space of time.

The comparison with the New Day couldn't be starker. I felt that was always struggling to accept who it was aiming at and what it was trying to do. This has a clear identity and delivers a fresh batch of content that should go down well with its audience.

I liked the broadsheet format, the in depth articles and the fact it wasn't trying to be something it was not. There's little attempt to recap or tell the news and it quickly moves into the meat of the paper by diving into the 'expertise' section. You get the impression that Kelly and the team know that its audience is fairly well versed in the ins and outs of referendum result - and instead focuses on encouraging them to consider why the result happened and how 'the 48 %' feel now.

The design feels about right and even though I didn't think the page one cartoon was great I applaud the bold attempt to do something different with the splash. It certainly feels a European thing to do.

It feels like there's definitely enough life in this topic for the initial four-title run (and perhaps more besides?), with an attempt to look at some of the regional complexity that the national press barely understands and offer a view from commentators in Europe too. Indeed, the double page 'view from Germany' was certainly a highlight of the first edition for me, with Bild editor Tanit Koch offering a fascinating insight into her paper's coverage.

I also quite like the paper's cheeky side. Whether it's proudly railing against Michael Gove's anti-expert comment or highlighting some of the negative pre-launch tweets under the header 'do leave' on page two, these touches hinted at a paper with a playful confidence and a clear voice. It also benefits from signing up exclusively non-politicians to help it carve out a different sort of analysis to that you'll see elsewhere.

For me, the referendum debate has thrown up an interesting side story about the way we consume news - something also covered at length in Katharine Viner's superb Guardian Long Read this week. The New European touches on this with its Reality Bytes page, looking at the way in which Twitter and Facebook give us a blinkered view of the news and opinions of others outside of our circle of friends.

If The New European is anything is anything to go by then maybe there really is life in print yet. This life, as with magazines, comes in 'niche' publications that reach out to a well-defined audience and do it well. It's what makes Private Eye a success - alongside the likes of the Spectator, New Statesman and Economist - and this paper delivers on this score too.

How much life there is beyond the initial four-week run probably depends on what happens next with Brexit as well as, of course, sales.

If issue one is anything to go by, this will have at least been a more-than-worthy experiment - allowing people to find a fresh voice at a time of great confusion. History, as they say, is normally only written by the victors. This fights against that tradition.  It'll be interesting to see if the sales go well and what, if anything, happens after issue four. I'll certainly be back for the next three.

Promises, promises: 11 failed pledges from both sides of the EU referendum campaign

What's a promise worth in politics these days? After writing my last post I started to think about all of the promises that had been reneged on during the course of the EU Referendum saga.

I came up with the following:

• David Cameron told us he'd stay on regardless of the result. He quit within hours
• The PM also said he would enact 'Article 50' but didn't
• George Osborne said he'd need to draw up a 'Brexit budget' if we voted to Leave. He hasn't
• Boris Johnson said the pound would be fine and the economy would be stable after the vote. It isn't
• The mop-haired ex Mayor then weighed up standing to deliver on the result he'd strived for and backed out
• Michael Gove repeatedly ruled himself out of standing to be Prime Minister. He then stood and stuck the knife into his old mate Boris
• Andrea Leadsom once warned Brexit would be a disaster. She now backs it
• Jeremy Corbyn promised to support the Remain campaign but has been accused of undermining its efforts and not-so-secretly wanting to be out
• We were promised £350 million more a week for the NHS. We won't get it
• The Leave campaign promised to control the levels of immigration. They probably can't
• Nigel Farage has stood down, saying his work is done. It isn't. (He also insulted the people we now need to win over to strike a new deal for Britain, nice work)

That's pretty damning I'd say. I don't want to just criticise politicians, but they should look at the list above and begin to understand why many people don't trust them.

The sad thing is I doubt I've even covered them all. Feel free to point out any I've missed below...

How do we know what the electorate actually wanted from EU Leave vote?

Photo: Unsplash

Life very rarely throws up questions that have a black and white ‘yes/no’ choice does it? I can’t quite help think that this hasn’t helped with the EU referendum. With a question of such complexity and magnitude boiled down to one simplistic question, chaos was probably always likely.

I last blogged on the eve of the ballot. A lot has happened since hasn’t it? Yet one thing is clear, no-one really knows what to do next.

Whether I like it or not (and I’m still convinced that it’s a terrible decision) the electorate chose to Leave. The trouble was, while there is a mandate to negotiate an exit, it’s not clear what else there is a mandate for. What did the people actually vote for?

The black and white nature of a yes/no referendum also allows people to make sweeping and inaccurate statements about both camps. Remainers aren’t all whiners just as much as Leavers aren’t all racist. Yet, because the cap fits for some in those respective sides, others are tarred with the brush.

Some Leavers want a strangely very similar relationship to the EU to that we have now. Others want a Norway style deal, some are keen on a more distant position and others want us to be as far away as possible. Some won’t countenance ‘free movement’ of people, others are happier to accept this. All of this variation is under the umbrella of the ‘no’ in the yes/no vote... and that’s not even considering the shades of grey within those arguing for yes.

So, what do we do? Blunder along into a position that is bound to be unsatisfactory? That’s the way it seems. Consider this: a negotiation that adopts a Norway-style relationship is likely to upset the 48% who voted to Remain AND all of the most vehemently anti-EU elements of the Leave voters. The mandate suddenly becomes a little flimsy.

People like Boris Johnson certainly don’t have the answer. Having been royally shafted by his fellow Leaver Michael Gove, Johnson ducked out of the race. Yet, let’s face it, he had no idea how to implement the result he’d helped to win anyway. He’s probably relieved to be able to snipe from the sidelines rather than having to do anything, passing the poisoned chalice to a colleague in the process.

Gove is a man who regularly repeated the assertion that he doesn’t think he is up to the job and proved too toxic to run the Department for Education. I still don’t think he really wants it. He’s probably achieved what he wanted by dashing Boris’ dreams. A playground-style rivalry played out at the highest level.

It’s certainly a precarious position. David Cameron – having let loose a yes/no question to this tricky topic – is the lamest of lame ducks. A decision on Heathrow and a debate on Trident have been parked until his successor is named. Nothing, it seems, can be achieved until the politicians sort out their squabbles. A final failure that will surely define Cameron’s premiership.

Then there’s George Osborne. The Chancellor had failed to wipe out the deficit in five years of ‘the coalition’ as promised and now, post Brexit, says it won’t happen by 2020 either. His sole purpose destined to be left unachieved. He now seems to think that by repeating the phrase ‘I want to offer reassurance’ that people will actually feel reassured. Why not try giving us some words and ideas that are actually reassuring George? Is it because you’re keeping your powder dry in the hope of clinging on to a job?

And what to make of the mess on the opposition benches? Right now, in the country’s hour of need, there is no opposition and no Government. Cheers guys.

I know some people feel Jeremy Corbyn has been hard done to in recent days but I can understand why his parliamentary colleagues have lost faith in him. His performance during the referendum debate was poor. We’re told he’s a man that sticks to his principles and convictions yet you get the impression he is a Eurosceptic and is happy to leave. So, why not say that? Irrespective of that, the man doesn’t command enough of a party to form an effective opposition any more and has to go. It might not be nice but that’s politics.

I can understand why some people have chosen to march, demonstrate and protest. It seems ridiculous that others now say they shouldn’t do so having argued that they are ‘pro democracy’ during the referendum. The trouble is that I doubt there’s a consensus solution among the marchers about what they think should happen next either.

We’re left awaiting the result of the Conservative Party leadership election to see how we’ll go forward. The final two candidates will, at least, offer differing visions of the future relationship with the EU but it feels a little unsatisfactory that 150,000 party members will get to choose that vision (having had their ‘final two’ whittled down for them). Some grim irony given that we apparently voted to end the rule of unelected and unaccountable figures.

Maybe we should’ve been given a better range of choices in the referendum? Maybe we should never have had one in the first place, leaving the politicians we choose to represent us to make the tough decisions on our behalf? Maybe we should be given a chance to say whether we agree with the final deal thrashed out with the EU? Maybe we should all pretend this never happened in a very British way and try to move on? Maybe Remainers should just step back and hope things aren’t that bad? Maybe Johnson and Farage should’ve had the decency to see through what they started?

So many maybes, so few answers. We’ve said ‘no’ to a question that really wasn’t a yes/no problem and all it has done is throw up other more complex questions. Questions of the nature that probably should’ve been thrashed out before the vote instead of tawdry nonsense, spun statistics and guff written on buses.

Some thoughts on the EU Referendum

Sometimes this EU referendum has got so tiring that you might just be best placed to choose whether you are ‘in’ or ‘out’ based on the status of your belly button.

Churlish perhaps, but not less nonsensical than some of the points being made as we approach polling day.

Before we get much further I might as well chuck my cards on the table. I’m voting Remain on Thursday and not just because I’ve got an ‘in’ belly button (too much information, sorry).

I tended to shy away from making my political views on individual topic too well known when I worked in journalism because I honestly made an attempt to be an impartial observer. I think/hope I managed that. Not that I expect many people care too much either way about my two penneth now but, you know, it’s cathartic to type it out.

The thought of Brexit actually fills me with dread. I’ve always thought that this debate should really be about their side proving, on the balance of probabilities, that we’d be right to make such a big change as leaving the European Union. I honestly don’t think they’ve got anywhere close. If you're still uncertain now then I'd say they've not done enough to persuade you either.

Neither side got off to the best of starts it has to be said. When the words 'Hitler' and 'World War Three' were thrown around by Boris Johnson and David Cameron you got a feeling for the sort of campaign that was coming.

I shan’t waffle on too much about experts because you’ll undoubtedly have seen all that elsewhere. Still, I do find it worrying to see the casual nature to which they’re all brushed aside by some on the Leave side. Of course experts have been wrong before, but it’s insufficient to simply use that line alone to oppose what they are saying. Whatever you think of the detail and some of the longer term forecasts, I struggle to formulate a case for thinking we’d not be worse off by leaving. I don’t expect the weather forecasts to be 100% accurate but if they say it’s going to chuck it down I pack a coat. What the economic forecasters say about Brexit makes me think some stormy clouds are looming if we follow that path.

Many people ask for ‘facts’ to help them make their decision. We’re being asked to vote on the future, of which there are no hard and fast ‘facts’. We have to weigh up the forecasts, predictions and promises from politicians, pundits and experts and it’s not really acceptable to complain about this if we don’t find it easy. It’s our right to vote and our duty to find the information we need.

Then there’s the tosh about £350 million. There have been exaggerations on both sides but this is the biggest whopper of the lot. Presumably it was too much hassle to get the Battlebus repainted with the true number (which they could still have used for the basis of their case) so they’ve had to stick with a ‘stat’ that just isn’t true. That this line unravels so quickly upon examination makes you question the judgement and accuracy of the rest of the campaign.

So much is confusing about the whole referendum debate. Most recently we saw Boris Johnson calling for the UK’s ‘independence day’ while, during the campaign, harking back to the nation’s ‘better days’. You know, when we had the empire. The same empire that the Americans cut loose from in their ‘independence day’. So, are we voting to come out of the EU because it has got too much like the British Empire in order to try to rekindle better times we had as the British Empire? My head hurts. Maybe Boris just meant he had a ticket to see the new film at the cinema on Friday when the tawdry campaign finally ends?

My head also hurt when I saw Nigel Farage’s hideous ‘Breaking Point’ poster but for a different reason. I’m all for robust campaigning but that was a step too far. Whether it was intended to or not, it reached into the nastiest of propaganda playbooks, the sort that whips up hatred of others. Everyone behind that poster – and I’m well aware that many Leavers were equally unsettled by the image – should be utterly ashamed of themselves. Look in the history books and you might see some similar images. You won’t be happy to see who used them.

I wish I’d had a pound for every mention of the ‘Australian style points system’ – the cliché of choice during the immigration debate. As someone who worked in Boston in Lincolnshire it would be wrong of me to argue that everything about immigration has been positive. Boston hasn’t had the investment it has needed to keep up with its population expansion and that still hasn’t been addressed. It isn’t alone. Yet this isn’t the fault of the migrants. The vast majority of them work hard and pay enough into the system to help fund better infrastructure.

Unemployment is, thankfully, low and the jobs being done by EU migrants would be necessary if we left the EU. I doubt those who yearn for ‘control’ would get what they want by a Leave vote. The predicted economic dip is definitely not worth the risk for such a flimsy promise.

The EU is far from perfect but too much of our view of it is clouded by caricature of the sort peddled by Boris himself as a journalist. ‘Brussels bureaucrats’ are much fewer in number than ‘Whitehall bureaucrats’, for example, and it is not strictly true to label the EU as unelected. We chose our MEPs (although too many of us don’t bother) and we also chose our Governments who then represent us at an EU level and also pick our commissioner. If we don’t like our MEP we can vote them out and if we don’t like the deal we are getting in Europe then we can kick our Government out and elect one that can do our bidding. Criticise the EU if you like but let's avoid such generalisations.

The EU has been a handy bogeyman for governments to hide behind and blame for all of our ills. Much of that mud has stuck and Cameron and co are now struggling to undo it.

Journalist Robin Lustig wrote a piece on the Huffington Post that resonated with me in this respect. It contained the following passage:

Between 1999 and March 2016, the UK was indeed outvoted in the Council 57 times. It abstained 70 times, and voted with the majority - wait for it - 2,474 times. In other words, over a roughly 15-year period, the UK’s elected representatives, members of a government that has to face the electorate every five years, voted in favour of 95% of the laws passed in Brussels.

So the UK Government does get its own way in Europe. We aren’t dictated to at an EU level. Add that into the fact that we’re not in the Eurozone or part of the Schengen agreement, throw in a few other opt-outs and rebates and you realise that we currently have our European cake and eat it. We won’t get better terms from the outside and that could diminish the trade, education and research relationships we benefit from.

Then there’s the fact that the likes of Michael Gove rail against the daily influence the EU has on policymakers. If the EU is so controlling, how did Gove manage to completely overhaul the schools system? Surely such fundamental change should be impossible with Brussels on our back? Or there’s HS2, benefits changes, tuition fees, military air strikes…big decisions that we’ve made for ourselves in our Parliament. It doesn’t add up to me and smacks me of people using the EU as an excuse. If we vote out, who will the next scapegoat be?

Finally, this whole ‘we want our country back’ nonsense makes me wince. It’s not unpatriotic to want to stay in the EU. We should stay, work with our neighbours and fight for a better future together. Walking away isn’t patriotic or anything to be proud of. I want us to play a full part of the world we now live in if that doesn't sound too woolly.

The world has changed since we joined the European project – globalisation has happened and we can’t ignore it. Barack Obama probably summed it up best when he said that our voice is amplified by being in the EU rather than being diminished. It’s the way we can have an influence that’s relevant to the day and age we live in. It won’t feel any more like ‘my country’ if we vote out, quite the opposite.

I don’t doubt that many people will think I’m talking nonsense. That’s the beauty of free speech. Let's still be friends though, eh? See you on the other side on Friday…

Hopefully not the last of those super Shadow Puppets

It feels like we need to enjoy The Last Shadow Puppets while they're here. Given their form, the respective members of this supergroup will soon be back with their own individual projects and, no doubt, leaving us waiting years for more.

That added a little added spice to their gig at De Montfort Hall on Tuesday night. Not only did we get to see a class act at the top of its game - but also a class act that so rarely comes out to play.

It feels like a second album is a good time to see any band. By then, not only does it have a bank of songs to fill a good set and confidence in its own performances, but it isn't too far removed from those joyous first hits that attracted you in the first place.

So it proved with The Last Shadow Puppets. The mix of the more retro songs from The Age Of The Understatement and the newer material from Everything You've Come To Expect made for a set that rattled along at a real pace.

The band's key players - Alex Turner and Miles Kane - offer up contrasting performances. Kane is the solid, serious musician, with the heavy lifting on the guitar. Turner slips into the frontman routine and, once he got into it, belted out the hits in some style.

There was little interaction with the audience - they just got on with delivering the goods - but Turner did make me chuckle by feigning to praise the city's football team before actually bigging up Kane. If it's possible to hear a glint in the eye then this was it.

The title song from the new album was one real highlight, as was The Dream Synopsis. Yet the surprise for me was Sweet Dreams TN, a song that was really lifted by a brilliant live performance. I'll certainly appreciate it more in future now. In fact the whole of the second album crackled with a real energy and came across well proving the group is no one album wonder.

Meeting Place brought the curtain down in typically class fashion, with a slick and memorable parting shot to round off a thoroughly enjoyable evening.

They didn't perform the excellent Pattern from the new album or Separate and Ever Deadly from the first album, but then that's The Last Shadow Puppets all over isn't it? Always leaving you wanting even more.

I do hope there'll be more from the group. It'll be worth the wait, no matter how long it is this time.

What I learned from...Why England Lose & Other Curious Football Phenomena Explained

My best laid plan for monthly blog on a book I've read hasn't exactly gone to plan. Still, better late than never I've come to the end of Why England Lose & Other Curious Football Phenomena Explained by Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski.

I'd borrowed this from a friend - who clearly bagged a bargain looking at the sticker - so it had come highly recommended. The book is essentially an attempt by Kuper and Szymanski to look at football with an economist's hat on.

The beauty of it is the balance struck by the authors. Economic theories and methodologies are explained in a pretty simple way, helping you to keep up with how and why the pair come to their conclusions. It's clever without being dry and insightful without being patronising.

The answer to the title question is, in short, that England win about as many games as they should given the size of the country, experience of international football and strength of the economy (the three key factors they use to gauge whether a nation meets its expectations). It'll be well worth bearing that in mind during the hype, hope and heat of the Euros this summer.

From a Forest fan's point of view, it's interesting to see Brian Clough and Peter Taylor held up for their mastery of the transfer market.

Quoting Peter Taylor's book 'With Clough By Taylor' it looks at three lessons that clubs can learn from Forest's dynamic duo. Those being:

*be as eager to sell good players as to buy them - spotting deterioration early
*older players are overrated
*buy players with personal problems at a discount and then help them deal with those problems

Plenty of clubs could do with a read of that section before blowing billions in this summer's transfer window.

Other issues range from looking at which footballing nation performs best (spoiler alert: Iraq does pretty well), an explanation of the winners of the European Cup and a look at how economists look at penalty shootouts.

Not every bit completely works and some of the information is understandably dated now, seven years on from publication, yet this was a fun read. It plays with some of football's conventional wisdom and offers a genuinely interesting sense of perspective. It's well worth a read, especially if you can find it at that place.

The Panama Papers coverage has been superb but what next for our papers?

There are those who love nothing more than to scoff at the Guardian, I know. Sometimes with very good reason too. But the paper deserves to be applauded - and probably awarded - for its superb coverage of the Panama Papers this week.

This story - the mass leak of data from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca - is one of those classic cases in which the printed press come into their own.

Sure, the material was available online and was covered on TV and radio extensively but this was a complex and detailed unfolding story. It was the sort of story that demands sitting down and going over several times to truly understand. Snippets can too easily be missed online while the broadcast media is a format that dictates the pace to you, rather than the other way around, and doesn't always allow for the level of detail the Guardian managed in print this week.

I don't buy a paper as much as I used to these days but have parted with £1.80 everyday this week and have thoroughly enjoyed it. The story has grown and evolved throughout the week, like a slow-burning Night Manager-esque thriller with a key difference. Most of the people mentioned have done nothing illegal.

The Guardian's coverage leaves you in no doubt of the fact that much of the information unearthed by the Panama Papers - shared with them by partners at Süddeutsche Zeitung - is perfectly above board. But that, for me, doesn't detract anything from the story. In fact, this feels like a watershed moment where people across many countries question what is and isn't right and why the law allows the rich and famous to manage their finances in this way. It has opened a debate about what should be legal and what is morally right too. For all that to be decided, we need to shine a light on this secret and largely unknown - to you and I anyway - world of offshore money and accounts. That's not to mention the lessons for David Cameron in handling the questions he's faced this week.

The story might also come at a watershed moment for the industry itself. It has not been lost on me that this may even be the last - or one of the last - big stories that will be published in this way as journalism addresses its future.

Perhaps buoyed by the Panama Papers coverage - or by the demise in print of the Independent - the Guardian today revealed that its cover price will soon be £2. That price feels symbolic, a figure that belongs to a 'premium product'. While I've been happy to shell out £1.80 every day this week, the price of the print paper is one of the factors that stops me being a more regular reader. I've bought this as a 'treat' because of the story and couldn't justify £10 a week every week.

In some respects I feel sad typing that. The modern, internet age has to come to terms with the fact that quality journalism costs money. By delivering such a good offering online for free the industry has shot itself in the foot a little and has now got to grapple with how to fund itself going forward. I say now but this was a question many have been wrestling with for some time, certainly as long as I was a journalist.

This is clearly an important time in the history of newspapers. The Independent and Independent on Sunday are no longer on the news stands every morning having taken the bold move to go 'online only'.

I read both titles' final editions with a tinge of sadness but, of course, am fully aware that it's people like me not buying these papers which means they cease to exist in print. Both bowed out with dignity, packed with quality writing on the sorts of causes and issues that have been an important part in their stories. They did themselves - and their proud joint history - justice.

In many respects the Indy has done what many others must have considered. It's a bold step but everyone in the industry has presumed some, if not all, papers will have to go online to move with the times. Sometimes 'going first' isn't the wisest move but I hope they find a way to make it work. The quality of the likes of Cockburn and Fisk is simply too good to disappear and the spirit of campaigning journalism mustn't be lost because it's no longer committed to paper. Is it naïve to hope the essence of the paper will live on? Perhaps. But if the Indy pulls it off it'd be some coup.

There is one more print milestone for the Indy, however. Tomorrow (April 9) marks the last of its editions of the i paper. This concise spin-off has been a welcome addition to the news stands and is a title I've regularly turned to as a solution to my lack of cash and time to invest in reading the chunkier papers. From Monday the torch is passed to Johnston Press. It'll be fascinating to see what - if anything - changes as a result. Hopefully very little. It'll be a huge challenge for the regional publisher (my former employer) to take on a national title.

Then of course, we've just seen the launch of the New Day. From what I've seen of the title - and it doesn't feel aimed at me so I'm probably not the best judge - it will take a while to find its place. I think its best editions so far have come when it has taken a big issue - one that maybe other papers aren't tackling - and done some big to highlight it. In a nutshell, that takes the ethos of the Indy and channels it to a different audience and is to be applauded. The price seems high (this seems a theme, maybe I'm a cheapskate?) and it'll be interesting to see if its lack of website helps or hinders its success.

The print Indy disappearing, the Guardian cost cutting and raising its print price to premium levels, the i beginning a new life and a new newspaper have all made for an intriguing few weeks. This is far from the end though. The Times, for example, recently announced it is focussing less on 'breaking news' and more on delivering 'editions'.

Alan Hunter, head of digital told Digiday: “Readers don’t come to us for breaking news; they can go to the BBC and Twitter for that, which are free. They come to us for the authority of our reporting, opinion and analysis. Breaking news has become a commodity, and it’s hard to charge people for it. We believe in the power of digital editions.”

The editions model - centred on 9am, midday and 5pm - will be interesting to see. Since going online papers have become much more like the broadcast media, feeding the 24-hour news cycle in the way they never did before. The Times' decision aims to step back from this. I wonder if others will follow.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the coin, Buzzfeed has launched a breaking news app. Online operators are continuing to change the content they deliver as they look to mature and build on their digital successes. Newspapers have to be mindful of these rivals and continue to offer the one thing that has stood them apart from other publications: journalism.

Which brings us neatly back to the Panama Papers. This week has been a high point for the printed press. Whatever the 'platform' or 'format', such journalism has to continue. It's over to 'the press' now to find a way to do just that in the future.