The first is to defend its territory and deter attack. We don’t need armed forces so we can fight a war, but we do need them to ensure we don’t find ourselves in one. They serve the same purpose as nuclear weapons and like the latter are one area of national expenditure which, if successful, is completely wasted. That is the whole puprose of effective defence spending, where waste is a measure of achievement! That might not sound attractive to politicians or taxpayers, but it’s a hard truth we have to swallow if we are to remain safe.

Defence is not an optional extra. It is essential and even existential. Without it nothing else a government does can be kept under its control, for we can be sure invading armies would not rule in the interests of the people. If we lose a war, that is the end of everything our society is. There would be no NHS. There would be no welfare state. We would be slaves of the occupying power with no rights, freedoms, or services. There is no point in a government doing anything if it can’t defend its jurisdiction and ensure it remains in control. I distinguish here between government, which continues, and parties which come and go. In order to protect our system and all the services a society has we must be able to defend ourselves. This goes beyond armed forces to manufacturing and self-sufficiency in food and materials. An island nation is easily blockaded. Imports are good, but we mustn’t depend on them for survival.

The second thing a government must do, once it has secured its territory, is provide a working Police and criminal justice system. Without those it can make as many laws as it likes, but no one need obey them. Without working law enforcement the law becomes irrelevant and government with it. In many parts of this country the law has already become optional for many. While I pay my Vehicle Tax, ensure I am insured, and display a registration number, there are now a large number of motorists on smaller vehicles such as motorcycles and scooters who do none of those things, and the Government does nothing about it. These people are a danger to the public, often ignoring road traffic regulations completely, but government response is to make things ever more difficult for lawful motorists while ignoring the others completely.

The Police rarely attend shoplifters or street robberies. They are too stretched to do so when their numbers have not kept up with the rise in population over the last 25 years. The courts are so overwhelmed cases take years to come to trial. The prisons are so full prisoners have to be released early not because it is safe to do so but because there is no room for them, and the prison staff are so exhausted they resign to find an easier job just as they have sufficient experience to do this job well.

Meanwhile the Government continues in its own little bubble believing it’s doing something when it’s becoming increasingly irrelevant to the world outside. Such governments get overthrown, either by external powers or by internal revolution, but neither of those would treat the ordinary people well.

Bad governments hand their people over to worse ones, and I fear that could happen sooner than any of us would like. Why don’t they wake up?