Nothing mellow in

When John Keats wrote his beautiful Ode to Autumn, he did not realise that for us, in the here and now, autumn is the season of party conferences.

And he certainly did not know that, in 2016, the political landscape would be in the turmoil we have witnessed over the past few months.

I don’t claim to be a political commentator but that has never stopped me from having an opinion.

First the Labour Party. I don’t care whether you love or hate Jeremy Corbyn, Britain is supposed to be a democracy.

Apparently democracy means something different in the Palace of Westminster.

While we, the common folk, have been led to believe the principle of one man, one vote, the bulk of Labour MPs seem to think that this means one MP, one vote and to heck with the rest of the people.

I am not a paid-up member of Labour or any other political party. However, anyone who has ever read this column will know that I sway firmly to the left.

That leaves me in a dilemma. I would normally vote Labour. Now I don’t know what to do.

The arrogance of those MPs who want to trample willy nilly over the wishes of party members is atrocious. They appear to have forgotten who put them in office in the first place.

They claim that Labour will have no chance of being elected into government and they are right. But it is their own actions that are bringing the party down – not their democratically elected leader.

Bullying seems to be an unfortunate characteristic in some in the Labour Party and we see it sometimes at the most local level as well as on the national stage.

Unfortunately, how Corbyn is being treated is bullying at its worst.

The Lib Dems, sold down the river by Nick Clegg when he formed a government with the Conservatives, are now under the leadership of Tim Farron.

He got in there at his party’s conference, by suggesting that any disillusioned Labourites sign up to the Lib Dems.

I will say one thing about Tim Farron – he is a hard worker.

Long before he became leader, I could expect at least one, if not more, emails across my desk from his office. He was so aware of local and national issues and always eager to help where he could.

Then there was the UKIP conference. They elected a new leader. She’s a woman. I didn’t know anything about her. A few days ago, she resigned. It doesn’t really matter because every time you see anything about UKIP it still seems to be Nigel Farage doing the talking.

Then there was the Conservative conference.

This is being headed by our new Prime Minister just months after David Cameron promised that whatever happened with the referendum he would stay on as PM. Then he decided he wouldn’t but would remain as a loyal backbencher and then threw the Tories into turmoil by announcing his resignation .

The message from the Tory conference was Brexit means Brexit and we are starting to leave the EU next year and will finish in 2019, I think. And still, nobody knows what Brexit will mean and still everyone is arguing about it.

But Theresa May is assuring us everything will be fine. Never mind that Nissan is making noises about job losses. Some are telling us life will be wonderful under a sovereign Britain. Some are telling us that workers can kiss their rights goodbye.

And by the way, who knows what is going to happen in Scotland. Are we facing Scoxit next?

They say the only thing we can be sure of is death and taxes and they are right.

Everything else is just so uncertain . When I think about it I only know one thing for sure – I know nothing!