My primary school teacher would occasionally chivvy us out of our bad habits with an assortment of admonitory apercus. One of her favourites was a quite usually attributed to the 19th century French poet, Charles Baudelaire. “The Devil’s greatest trick is to convince the world he doesn't exist,” she would intone gravely.

She also quoted from the Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis in which a senior devil instructs his nephew on how to bring about the eternal damnation of a chap known only as ‘the patient’. Even the classroom bams sat up during that one.

The UK Tories are the greatest disciples of this satanic legerdemain. In order to secure power, millions of working class people who have been the multi-generational victims of their capitalism and profiteering must be persuaded nevertheless to vote for them. That the Tories have held power more often than Labour in the democratic era shows how well they have sold the lie.

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The idea that could help save Glasgow: Sauchiehall square

Indeed, since the middle of the 1990s they have finessed the masquerade exquisitely. The business of running a country can be very taxing and exacts a massive physical and psychological toll. All those deeds and private practices in which they could once indulge themselves free from scrutiny and public censure were becoming more difficult to conceal.

It’s all very well saying that a decent cabinet post or select committee chairmanship can grease the wheels of your post-parliamentary career. But that’s not going to work if your dabs get found all over dodgy deals with people working against the interests of your country........

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