Sally Allen: Inspirational true legends like Lionel give us hope for the future

Well, the last two weeks have seen massive ups and downs. I have seen the worst possible judgement and a celebration of excellence. A complete rollercoaster of the extremes of human behaviour.

I will start with the worst, so sadly that always means I have to highlight the numerous inadequacies of politicians. I would prefer to write good things, but they just keep giving me masses of ammunition to hail bullets at them! So, first in the frame has to be Rishi Sunak, who actually took my breath away with his display of chronic bad judgement in his total disrespect for the fallen heroes in WW2. They gave selflessly and yet they received no respect from our current Prime Minister. Obviously, an 80th anniversary only comes around every 80 years, and it means that the survivors are unlikely to make it to even the 81st anniversary or any other.

The excuse for this behaviour that I was told also didn’t make any sense. Having to rush off to ITV to pre-record an interview? This could have easily been rearranged by his minions with very little effort. Equally he could have said he was busy celebrating the freedom that our fallen servicemen have gifted us. I think everyone would have understood and no matter how fulsome and unreserved his apology was, Rishi is now toast.

On the other hand, Sir Keir Rodney Starmer KCB KC always gives me a queasy feeling every time I see or hear him. He was after all, Director of Public Prosecutions from 2008 to 2013.

This means that he was the head of the legal body who decided not to prosecute Jimmy Savile. Although not directly responsible, he was in charge or all prosecutions, and therefore surely has to carry some of the responsibility for a chronic lapse of judgement. He has also denied he was ever a friend of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, despite previously describing him as one.

So not exactly reliable in what he says. The only exception to these u-turns seems to be his constant reference to his father having been a toolmaker! I am not sure why he thinks this might make him a better bet as our Prime Minister.

As for Sir Ed Davey, he is so bland, he is largely unknown by most of the country. Sir Ed is currently facing further pressure over his handling of the Post Office IT scandal when he was postal affairs minister in the coalition government. In May 2010, the Liberal Democrat leader refused to meet Alan Bates, the sub-postmaster who led the campaign to expose the scandal, saying he did not believe it "would serve any purpose". He has now said he was "deeply misled by Post Office executives". Yet another chronic lack of judgement.

I don’t know about you, but I think that good judgement is a fundamental requirement for anyone aiming to run our country. Surely it is time that these political pygmies take responsibility for their actions.

Meanwhile, French president Emmanuel Macron’s shock decision to call a snap general election has backfired disastrously. His centrist Renaissance party will be crushed between right-wing populist Marine Le Pen’s National Rally and a new combined hard-left front next month. Last week, French finance minister Bruno Le Maire warned the country is facing its “Liz Truss moment”. That's shorthand for a country whose currency and economy goes into meltdown because global bond markets think their rulers have the financial acumen of a wet lettuce. Le Maire said France is heading for a financial crisis regardless of whether left or right win, because neither side is going to tackle the country's spiralling debts.

Over the other side of the pond, it is no better. There is a gaga President who is clearly now just acting as a puppet for the men in suits who run the democratic party and a former President who was charged with 34 counts of falsification of business records in the first degree, which is a felony in New York. He pleaded not guilty when he was arraigned last year but has subsequently been found guilty on all counts.

This leaves us all in an unstable and somewhat scary position now and in the future. You have to ask why Sunak felt he had to go to the country at this precise moment in time when he could have waited until the end of this year. If he had, Nigel Farage would have taken up Trump’s offer of helping him back into the White House and the Reform threat would have dissipated. Now Farage is firing on all cylinders and expects to be leading the opposition in the Commons next month.

Added to this, if Sunak had waited, maybe he could have put a number of his recently scrambled together promises into action and the lack lustre Chancellor, Hunt could have produced a mini budget to make us actually believe that there was a glimmer of hope that they actually might make a difference for the better after 14 years of yet again, bad judgement.

Meanwhile, in good old Torbay last week, we had a celebration of the best of business in the Bay and it was impressive. Personally, I sponsored the Innovation Award. I did this because to me without innovation in any business you are dead in the water. The very impressive and well-deserved winner in the category, was Spirent Communications, a high-tech company based in Paignton that uses simulation technology to rigorously test the performance and reliability of GPS systems around the world, they also took home the Overall Business of the Year Award. Fantastic.

The best was yet to come though, the wonderful Lionel Digby, a true legend in our community was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award. We also had a video clip from the inspirational Mark Hawkins from the summit of Kilimanjaro, which he had just scaled in a fund-raising effort for Rowcroft Hospice. What an achievement.

I was also delighted to hear that Alan Bates has received a well-deserved knighthood in the King’s Birthday Honours. So, the rest of the world might be going to Hell in a handcart, but at least in our tiny corner of the world there is some inspirational hope for the future.