I have hardly watched any news since just before Christmas. And you know how it is when you’ve been on holiday and when you come back it takes time to understand that you are back and that you will have to adjust to what is called normality, as opposed to the beach, or the mountains, or the Metropolitan Museum? Well, I’ve been away from the news for two weeks (apart from an accidental, careless sight of the Home Secretary telling the nation that asylum seekers are only genuine if they make their applications in the first safe country they cross on their journey and not bother us here; at that point I fumbled for the off-switch, rushed out of the room, and went back into news-blocking mode. Oh, but before I found the off-switch I caught a glance of a newly inaugurated Brazilian president, and then I was really desperate for the off-switch.

Anyway, yesterday morning I watched the Andrew Marr Show and found I didn’t understand much of what was being said. There was Theresa May repeating the words of her old recordings. When she felt that perhaps they had lost some of the impact they once had she reverted to that real old-time-religion favourite: “On the 29th of March we will leave the European Union, take back control of our borders, control of our laws, and control of our waters with a deal that is in the interests of all the British people”, she sang. Her voice took on a slight Thatcher intonation, and the whole performance, with the accompanying jangly necklace, was obviously designed to bring the likes of Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg to a premature orgasm. As a matter of fact, I never really did understand what “control of our waters” actually meant, but now, since my news-blocking effort, I don’t understand what any of it means. Still, life goes on and I must try to revise my Brexit vocab.

Then there was Labour Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth, who also repeated a lot of old songs, though without the jangly necklace, about the damage Tory policies were doing. The songs all spoke the truth (and I cheered up a bit) but then he seemed unable to answer any of the really interesting questions, like what Labour’s own policy on social care and the NHS would actually be. From his first words, I think he was saying something like “We’ll look to see what the Tories are offering and then we’ll …” and I felt the urge to block the news again. Then he was asked whether his plan for the NHS would be full public ownership like in the old days. He muttered something about “there will always be a role for the private sector”. This sounded like a kind of partnership – a public-private partnership even. This has usually been code for “private”, both under Tory and Labour governments. These schemes are ones where private calls the shots, makes everything more expensive and rakes in the profit. That’s its purpose. So Jonathan’s words were worrying. Because many of us thought those days would be over under the new politics. Not that we want to go back to the old days, far from it. We thought we would go forward to a democratically accountable public ownership, in which workers and users of services would call the shots. That was never the case in the old days. The old nationalised industries and public services were run by more or less the same people who ran them when they were private. And they ran them on the same lines. At the end of the day they were supposed to make a profit, like their capitalist predecessors. And they mostly did.

It’s time to tell a story. Long years ago, when Sir Keith Joseph was Education Secretary, I interviewed him for an audio magazine for the blind. We touched on the private versus public question. He agreed that publicly owned outfits make a profit: “Oh, yes, they make a profit, of course, but – well, look at that splendid jumper you’re wearing. I don’t know where you got it, where did you buy it?”

“I don’t remember,” I replied nervously. “Marks & Spencer’s probably.”

“Very well, then. What do you want us to do? Nationalise Marks and Spencer’s? And what would happen then? They’d say, ‘You can’t have the colour you want – we’ll choose it for you; you can’t have the pattern you want – we’ll choose it for you; you can’t have the style you want – we’ll choose it for you.’ Is that want you want?”

I can’t remember my answer, but anyway he slowly calmed down. Of course, he wasn’t really worried about my rights, or customer satisfaction, or the service provided. His real concern was that in a publicly owned operation the profits would go to the wrong people: instead of going into the pockets and coffers of his friends they would go to the state, where they might be spent on improving the service. Of course, in “the old days” governments often spent the money on things that, if we’d been asked, we would have vetoed. But we weren’t asked. That’s why now, after Corbyn’s election, the eyes of some of us lit up when we heard the words “democratically accountable” attached to the words “public ownership”. And that’s why my eyes glazed over and I was tempted to head for the news-blocker when Ashworth mentioned “a role for the private sector”. But I thought, No, I’ve closed that door behind me. I must now find my way back to being a responsible citizen. It’s difficult though. There aren’t that many role models.

The other thing I noticed yesterday was that America is in lockdown. That sounds uncomfortable. Like when, during the dockers’ strike in the 1970s the Heath government said they would “sequestrate” the union’s funds. “By heck,” said union leader Hugh Scanlon, “We’re going to be sequestrated – that sounds painful!” But Trump clearly doesn’t understand how workers, even those in government departments, feel when they’re sent home or have to work without pay. “They’re 100% behind me,” declared Trump. Yes, and hopefully they’re all armed to the teeth!