Clarkson’s bargain bin economics and life observations a revelation

I gave up buying books some time ago. I think it was around the time I stopped buying cassettes and CDs’. I just couldn’t fit them all into the rucksack I used to travel from home to home. Life was simple, uncomplicated and free pre matrimony.

30 years on and a trip to town with my two sons and we came across a bargain bin outside a rare find these days, an iron mongers with a section selling nazi memorabilia. Only in Llanelli.

As it was nearing Christmas and fearing the boys were going to buy me yet another pair of jogging bottoms I would have to donate to charity or a T-shirt emblazoned with something about being an old codger I signalled that I might like a couple of the Clarkson books I found in the bargain bin. At £1 each they were within their budget for Dad’s gift. By the time I paid for the wrapping paper, tape and their lunch I was down a few pounds.

I began reading one of the 20 plus books by Jeremy Clarkson on December 29th coincidentally the same day a friend sent me a pie chart showing the planned total capital funding of Welsh Government for the next three years. Serendipity it may be but Clarkson love him or loathe him is a veritable soothsayer. His book The World According To Clarkson; is it really too much to ask, Penguin Books, 2013 contains his columns from The Sunday Times Newspaper.

In the chapter ‘Traffic storm troopers won’t let me buy a bra’ Clarkson talks about the economy and makes an analogy between what governments do with the economy and what the producers of Top Gear do in order to bring the show in on budget and on time. Essentially making cut after cut until they are left with something acceptable or something they can get away with. He talks about the demise of his town centre through jobsworths implementing parking fines. He mentions the loss of independent shops and a local newspaper and the bland featureless desert towns consisting of estate agents, fast food outlets and charity shops. He wagers that the same thing is happening in your town and it is. He suggests those in charge cling to the outdated and discredited theory that man causes global warming and that councils are employing civil enforcement officers whose sole job is to kill the town.

Clarkson suggests that instead of stripping muscle and bone one needs to lose a limb in order for the process to be effective and to leave some semblance of acceptability to the drastic measures taken. Clarkson suggests that the UK Government would for example, be better off cutting off Scotland. He could easily have included Wales. There is method in the madness of the man who really should run for P.M.

In another chapter ‘Surgery to cut the deficit-cut off Scotland’ he suggests the economy would benefit from losing entire government departments like the Department for Energy and Climate Change. It is well documented that Clarkson is the sworn enemy of the WOKE community, tree huggers, hippies, lefties, and Climate Change Activists. Thankfully they remain a minority deluded in believing they speak for the majority. Clarkson’s plan for better use of the economy albeit in jest was written in June 2010.

Clarkson would not have set eyes on the latest document from our Climate Change obsessed Welsh Government but if he had I am sure it would have featured in one of his columns and he would have opted to lose Wales too. The plan shows a huge section given over to Climate Change with much smaller fractions for health, education, the economy and rural affairs; essentially everything more important in the lives of the people of Wales than climate change and cycling gets less. In a previous editorial I mentioned that any sixth form economics student could adjust the expenditure and balance the books in favour of providing services, a decent education system and health system as well as opportunities for young entrepreneurs to build a scaffold economy for Wales. This 2022 to 2025 plan emphasises the madness Clarkson rages against albeit satirically in his book.

In a final bit of serendipity or soothsaying Clarkson writes about the impact of everyone having a camera on their phone. The chapter ‘Please carry on filming, i’m only burning to death’ suggests that we are all now obsessed with filming or photographing everything, which has desensitised us to what is actually happening in front of our eyes. He accepts he is a target for fans and newspapers but bemoans the invasion of privacy when going about his daily business. He recalls being filmed urinating at a Service station urinals by a lorry driver standing next to him. He surmises that this clip is now probably on Youtube. Clarkson recalls the incident when a plane carrying Nigel Farage crashed and photographs of Farage and the pilot hanging upside down in the wreckage appeared in national newspapers. His point was that someone took those photographs first before thinking about the safety of the people and primarily considering how much the images were worth. Where have we seen an appalling example of this recently?

Top Gear is now a shadow of its former self but thankfully Clarkson remains that stoic man mountain reminiscent of so many Dads of his generation who have an opinion and are not afraid to express it. My sons often winced when Clarkson let loose and there followed some discussion about the merits of the rantings of a man who like their Dad they had to oppose. I’m glad to say that common sense prevailed and they have succumbed to the Clarkson charm and I wager they will be off with the books they bought me before next Christmas. As for the cutting of spending by Welsh Government it is for you to decide what should stay and what should go. Senedd Elections May 2026. Feel free to email us your own Doughnut/pie chart newsdesk@carmarthenshirenewsonline.com

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