If, gentle reader, you had hopes of more posts this week I must disappoint you. With great haste, to spare the taxpayer the cost of today’s lunch and half the minimal loss of earnings allowance for today, the clerks just discharged everyone not currently serving on a jury. Those of us in our second week were discharged without thanks. Those, like me, in our first week are required back at court next Monday to have our lives devalued further at the hands of our surly masters. 

So, maybe next week …

This week and next I am on jury service.

The jury is the last of Britain’s institutions in which I have any faith. I learned about “criminal equity” (known in the US as "jury nullification") during the legal history part of my long-ago law degree. For example, the hated “game laws” providing for capital punishment of poachers were reformed against the wishes of the landowning gentry in Parliament because juries refused to send men to their deaths for those crimes. They acquitted the guilty to subvert the system. In the end, to secure convictions, Parliament had to scale down the punishments.

As a libertarian I believe that most of our current laws should not exist. Perhaps there will be some scope for criminal equity if I am asked to convict someone under one of those superfluous laws? I should be so lucky.

So far, as I was not selected for any of the trials, I have had a day of my life wasted in a scruffy, noisy and uncomfortable "Jury Assembly Room." Looking around me, it's clear I am – as is of course to be expected – going to meet people outside my usual circle. I look forward to that with interest. As names were called out for each jury, there were precious few Smiths and Joneses. I'd estimate about one traditional British name per jury. Interestingly, there were almost as many names from Eastern Europe as from the Sub-Continent. I may get the chance to practise my Polish.

The officials marshalling us citizens like cattle seemed efficient enough though their training did not involve public speaking. They had difficulty projecting their voices (if indeed they were trying) and they were not supported by any sound system. Given the noise from the in-room cafe (selling meals at precisely £5.71 – the maximum allowed expense), the general hubbub of a crowded room and the fact that the court is under the Heathrow flight path, that made it difficult to hear them at times.

They had the usual condescending tone of people whose wages are funded by state force. I enjoyed it when the lady welcoming us had a script to read thanking us for our contribution. She just couldn't sound convincingly grateful. Let's just say I fancy my chances if I ever get to play her at poker.

I also noticed the usual over-familiar use of first names. The private sector is just as guilty of that these days, but it's particularly annoying from state functionaries from whom I cannot walk away. In fairness, I despise the British state so much that its employees would need to be epically polite to please me, even if they wanted to. In truth, if they knew how much they get on my nerves, I suspect it would make their day. So I must just grin and bear it.

My only direct interaction was to enquire politely about reimbursement of taxi costs. The lady said "no" before I finished my sentence and without enquiry about my reasons for asking. I am not short of money for the fares and will put my own comfort and convenience first regardless. I just wish now I'd never asked. It wasn't worth the irritation for the sake of a few quid. I guess the optimist in me still hopes for one pleasant interaction before I die with the state funded by most of my life's work.

It's a criminal offence to write about details of the trial or jury deliberations. I wouldn't do it anyway as that's a good law. We could not reasonably ask jurors to participate in criminal trials if they were at risk of their identities or opinions being exposed to people they might convict. However, I will let you know my general impressions of the process.

Let's hope I retain my faith when my service ends.

Yes, I know the movie character was Ratched. Bear with me. According to Wikipedia, she is also;

a popular metaphor for the corrupting influence of institutional power and authority in bureaucracies

She's a symbol of what I want to write about today and her name echoes the essential problem. 

Sir Keith Joseph was a key influence on what became known as Thatcherism. He coined the phrase ratchet effect to describe the way in which each new Socialist government moved policy leftwards, whereas a Conservative government never moved it back. If the UK State was a car, then the Labour Party was the accelerator (gas pedal), the Conservative Party was the brake and there was no steering wheel.

The direction of political travel was never in doubt and only the speed could be adjusted by the electorate. Sir Keith's point, well-taken by Margaret and constantly railed at by Tory wets was that the ratchet had to be broken if the Conservatives were actually to move towards their goals. For all that Leftists call themselves "progressives" (perverting the language as they love to do in order to thwart honest discussion) real human progress should be in quite another direction.

Taken to its logical conclusion, the end result of the ratchet effect must be that everything either belongs to the state or is under state control. Democratic Socialists and Communists have always had the same ultimate goal. The former are just more patient. They will cheerfully discuss each step of the journey with the electorate, as long as the planned route never changes. All it takes to see the destination is to zoom out a little and observe the completely consistent direction they and all their predecessors have taken. 

Margaret's achievement in breaking the ratchet was significant. For a while, though she had no such intention, the Left even feared that it had been reset so that the wheel would turn the other way. Tony Blair certainly felt the need to reassure voters that Thatcher's reforms would not be endangered by electing the Labour Party under his leadership. He even claimed to be her ideological heir; a bold lie even by political standards. 

It has been clear for some time however that Sir Keith's ratchet has been refurbished, well-oiled and set back as it was before Thatcher. This is why, as I made clear in my last post, I had no interest in the Conservative Party's choice of new leader. It turns out I was wrong that it didn't matter at all, however. The choice of the political naïf Truss has at least shone a searchlight on the situation. She tried to be a sort of Thatcher mini-me and failed dramatically. At the first hint of any movement rightwards, all hell broke loose. Even though another self-absorbed leadership contest will surely scupper the Tories for the foreseeable future, her position is already in doubt. 

I am not sure if it needs a conspiracy theory to explain why a nation that keeps voting Conservative keeps moving leftwards. I don't believe there are dark cabals planning it. I don't think they're even needed. Someone like me, who believes – along with my namesake – that 

Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.

is simply never going to apply for employment by a state as huge and pervasive as the UK's.

I have horrified state employees in conversation by saying, in perfect truth, that my conscience would not allow me to sleep at night if I had their job. Not because what they do each day is necessarily always bad, but because every penny they are paid to do it has been taken from others by force. My proudest boast is that every penny I ever earned came from contracts freely entered into by clients with choices. If I had ever worked for the state, that would not be true. 

So it's not surprising that, when the state apparatus has grown to be – as it is in the UK – a gorilla in a flea circus, that the people working for it are broadly in favour of a state on such a scale. No conservative or classical liberal could possibly wish for that, but it's the highest aspiration of a Leftist. So the Prime Minister may be "Conservative", her cabinet may have some "Conservatives", and the electorate may be mostly conservative by instinct, but the state apparatus rolls leftwards regardless. It's going to take leadership by someone with more of a personality than Truss to take on that mighty foe and win.