Andy Burnham’s speech to the Cop climate conference in Turkey was so vital to the survival of the human race that it took five minutes and 52 seconds. Not so much a speech as an egg-timer.
Mr Burnham and flunkeys (numerous) flew to Antalya on Wednesday in a government aeroplane. They were met by the provincial governor, who rolled out a blue carpet.
Cue shots of Eyelashes Andy and governor Hulusi Sahin looking grim-faced (the climate is a serious matter). Eyelashes Andy strode to a gleaming limousine; the next morning found him addressing an almost empty hall.
‘My fellow leaders, your excellencies,’ began Mr Burnham. Those plural nouns were optimistic. Endless rows of seats were empty. Almost nobody had turned up but there was a knot of about ten British acolytes, including the Mayor of London, Lord Khan, in the front row. Apart from that: tumbleweed. You get more people at day three of a Lib Dem conference.
After announcing the appointment of a special representative for climate security, Mr Burnham bellowed: ‘Britain is back.’
The words echoed. Shades of that moment in the rocky Wadi Rum in Lawrence of Arabia (1962) when Peter O’Toole has no one for company except a camel.
Of the bewitching Dame Emily Thornberry MP, said to have been airfreighted to the souks of Antalya in all her dimpled glory, there was no sign. Mr Burnham’s speech was possibly too early in the day – the dame is not a morning person.
Not that the entire Cop shindig was so dozy. Mr Burnham’s speech clashed with a Greta Thunberg press conference and that was packed. Ms Thunberg told hundreds of disciples that planet Earth was ‘being killed and we know by who’.
Andy Burnham delivers his speech to the Cop31 Climate Change Conference in Turkey on Thursday
A vicious attack, egad, on publicity-seeking prime ministers who ride gas-guzzling aeroplanes 1,900 miles to make six-minute speeches to an empty room.
Mr Burnham was the only G7 leader to bother to attend this year’s Cop. Not even Canada’s damp-as-nappies PM, Mark Carney, made the pilgrimage. For company, Mr Burnham had to settle for dignitaries from Tonga, Lebanon, the Solomon Islands and Lesotho. The prime minister of Palestine received a standing ovation for his speech. Israel-bashing always goes down well at these international knees-ups.
Were one mean enough to note that Mr Burnham failed to bag a standing ovation, that will have been because there was almost no one there to stand. Still, the trip got him out of London for a day. And Turkey’s always nice. Back at Westminster we had culture questions and an urgent question on the security of our military bases.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy stuck both hands in pockets and jawed about broadcasting bosses’ failures to keep sex-maniac celebrities under control. She was going to summon the telly people and give them a jolly good talking-to. One doubts it will have much effect – she and her ministers speak such undiluted cliche, their words might as well be pebbles.
It’s ‘I have to say’ this and ‘frankly’ that. Adverbs and adjectives are sprayed with abandon. No10 was ‘highly committed’, MPs were ‘outstanding advocates’ or ‘shining examples’ and we heard of ‘youth strategies’, ‘place-based funding’, ‘high-potential clusters’, ‘priority super-clusters’, ‘thriving ecosystems’ and ‘highly complex negotiations across the football pyramid’.
We have fallen a long way from the days when ministers for the arts were bookish and took pride in our language. Ms Nandy and her colleagues might as well be ministers for the department of bubblegum, such is the pap they blow.
Defence minister Luke Pollard was later asked about security scares at RAF bases. The Americans have been so spooked that they have withdrawn war planes from our naked isles. Lincoln Jopp (Con, Spelthorne) asked if Washington had given us warning of its intentions.
Mr Pollard: ‘The Defence secretary has already set out that we have been in discussions with the US for some time. The movement of US aircraft is a matter for the United States.’ Translation: ‘No.’