Forget the budget, return of Gorgeous George is the big story in politics - Vladimir McTavish

Ignore this week’s budget. The big story in politics is the return of George Galloway. Say what you like about Gorgeous George but his victory in the Rochdale by-election will bring some much needed colour back to British politics. Personally, I am not a fan.

George Galloway’s impersonation of a cat on Celebrity Big Brother made him a ‘national laughing stock’, but he will certainly rattle Keir Starmer’s cage says Vladimir McTavish

His stance on Palestine is totally inconsistent with his views on Scottish independence. His support of Saddam Hussein and his impersonation of a cat on Celebrity Big Brother made him a national laughing stock, but he will certainly rattle Keir Starmer’s cage and he has clearly already got the wind up Rishi Sunak.

After the Rochdale result, Sunak was engaging in a familiar Tory battle cry, reminiscent of Margaret Thatcher’s warnings of “the enemy within” from her 1983 campaign. Sunak made a speech denouncing the behaviour of pro-Palestinian demonstrators and climate change activists. But many people were left feeling confused. When he claimed that “forces here are trying to tear us apart”, most of us assumed he was talking about the Conservative Party.

Scottish Tories have threatened to upset the apple cart this week, in protest at the government continuing to levy the windfall tax on energy suppliers. Whether any of them have the balls to resign, time will tell. Andrew Bowie, Conservative MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine and a junior minister whose brief includes “Net Zero” has threatened to vote against his party. We have truly entered some bizarre parallel universe when a minister for Net Zero is banging the drum for the oil companies.

Whatever carrot-and-stick approach the Tories may use between now and election day, they look almost 100 per cent certain to lose. However, one can never be sure about these things. Voters can be fickle. Voters can also be incredibly dim-witted too. And they can also decide not to turn up.

Here in Australia, voting is compulsory, which seems a good idea. According to urban legend, great train robber Ronnie Biggs was arrested because he did not turn up to vote at his local polling station when he was living Melbourne under the name of Terence Cook.

I’m not sure about compulsory voting. Australia currently has an OK Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, whose Labor Party made climate change a priority when they were elected in 2022. However, Australians do have a track record in electing utter idiots such as uber-Christian Tony Abbot and climate change denier Scott Morrison. Nonetheless, they have avoided the enormous electoral clangers that have happened here and in the USA.

Who can forget 2016, the year the West went crazy? Britain voted for Brexit and the US elected Trump. Thanks goodness Andy Murray won sports personality of year that December, a result which single-handedly restored my faith in democracy. Given 2016’s voting patterns up until then, I had Oscar Pistorius as odds-on favourite to win.

Worryingly, it looks like Trump could well win again in 2024. Anyway, those bonkers decisions from eight years ago took place under a system where the public had the option of not voting.

How utterly crazy would things have turned out if it had been compulsory to cast your ballot? We could well have been looking at Homer Simpson in the White House. So no big difference.