THE safety of the West may not be in the strongest hands.

Calamitous ex-premier Liz Truss, now the author of the scarifying Ten Years to Save the West, had the chance to step up when she was confronted by her communist opponent in Swaffham, Norfolk.
 
But all she could say after Lorraine Douglas had introduced herself as the communist contender for South-West Norfolk was “oh” and scuttle away protected by her security detail.
 
“She was not interested in engaging in any sort of a discussion,” Douglas states, which does indeed sound like the former prime minister, a diva of dogmatism.
 
Still, fleeing if you see yourself as on the front line of saving civilisation is not really walking the talk, or the book. But then that is Truss’s story — a woman besotted with free markets who cannot accept that it was those very markets which called time on her premiership in a record-breaking 47 days.
 
The politician who will be forever known as “lettuce Liz” after the tabloid-sponsored vegetable which turned out to have a longer shelf life now has to convince her constituents to give her another go.
 
Her majority is imposing, but her admirers are thin on the ground in Thetford, one of the largest towns, and probably the most working-class, in her seat.
 
Approaching two elderly women advancing down the main street, the Star enquires what they think of their MP. With looks of frozen horror, they say “No way” and “Don’t even go there” as they make off.
 
The same question put to a younger woman provokes such an eloquent expression that words are almost superfluous. “She is awful,” is the answer, with every syllable extended for impact.
 
“She’s never here,” she adds. Indeed, you are more likely to find Truss on an obscure US cable channel than on the highways and byways of Norfolk, perhaps because there is less chance of encountering Douglas there.
 
Her companion says he will vote for her because he is “always blue.” Probing gently, the Star suggests that she wasn’t a very good prime minister.
 
“But she got to be prime minister, so that means she’s top echelon,” comes the rejoinder. Satisfied with this logic, he moves off, with his female friend shooting a look of militant dissent over her shoulder.
 
Truss may be off “saving the West” but in Thetford, they do not seem to be convinced that they need saving. Polite questioning in the local WH Smith as to the number of copies of the local MP’s book they have sold is met with entirely blank looks.
 
None seems to be the answer.
 
Douglas has read her opponent’s tome, however, so you (and I) don’t need to. Who does “the West” need saving from?
 
“China,” Douglas responds, “Although she does not really articulate what the threat is.” In the course of her campaigning, did Douglas find the people of South-West Norfolk were anxious about the Chinese menace?
 
“I have not heard a single word about China,” the communist candidate says. That turns out to be tempting fate as five minutes later a Thetford man is really very angry to be given a communist leaflet.
 
“Go and vote for Mao Zedong,” he splutters, ignoring that the great helmsman can’t be on the ballot as he has been dead 48 years, other considerations notwithstanding.
 
It turns out that our friend’s father had been taken a Chinese prisoner during the Anglo-US aggression in Korea and had not enjoyed the experience.
 
So British imperialism’s history blows through the streets of Thetford, it seems, which is apposite since it is the birthplace of Tom Paine.
 
The great man is commemorated by a museum, a hotel and a very garish golden statue gifted to the town by his admirers in New York City.
 
Thus the roots of the rights of man are to be found here in the Truss-Douglas battlefield. It is a struggle of property rights against people’s rights, or the rights of man against the wrongs of Truss.
 
The people’s champion is a Londoner who has spent her life in the public services and who has lived many years in Norfolk and knows its problems. Some are no less dramatic than those faced by workers in the big cities.
 
For example, there is no NHS dentist in the constituency. “Norfolk is a dentists’ desert,” Douglas says, “And the main hospital is falling down.”
 
Public transport is a mess. “Every village has a station road in it, but they don’t have a station,” she points out. That needs reversing.
 
The party has never stood in South-West Norfolk before, so perhaps Truss’s surprise at being confronted with a living, breathing communist is understandable.
 
“I know that there will be people who will attack us and misrepresent what the Communist Party of Britain stands for,” Douglas says.
 
But she is winning support. One woman has been won over by her pro-Palestinian stance, saying that she had been intending to spoil her ballot but would now vote communist instead.
 
“We’re standing to bring a message of hope to the people of South-West Norfolk, and to show them that there is an alternative to more of the same and more cuts, more austerity,” she adds.
 
“It’s time to stop making working people in this country pay through the nose for the necessities of life. It shouldn’t be necessary to do that. And we can organise ourselves a lot better than we are.”
 
Housing is one of the biggest challenges. “We don’t need more executive home developments in Norfolk. We’ve got more than enough of those,” Douglas points out.
 
“What we’re missing is genuinely affordable homes for our young people and for people who can’t afford to rent in the private market and can’t afford to buy.
 
“We want an end to austerity, we want to see public services properly invested in and we want to see the needs of our population met.
 
“To me, it’s an indication of barbarism in the country that the most needy, the most vulnerable, are unable to get the help that they need to be able to live decent lives and to live independently in the community.”
 
Douglas pulls no punches. Truss country is getting the full programme.
 
“We would take immediate steps to nationalise the banks, to bring those privatised industries back into public control and ownership.
 
“We would tax the rich and make them pay their fair share, instead of putting the entire burden of the economy onto the poorest people in in our society and onto people who can least afford to pay.
 
“There is a huge job to be done to reconstruct the country after the damage that’s been done, particularly in the last 14 years.”
 
“Do you want to live in a society which is run for the interests of the majority, or do you want to continue living in a society which is being run for the benefit of the super-rich and the corporate elite? That is the choice.”
 
It is indeed. And support for “Lettuce Liz” and her free-market obsessions is wilting. Perhaps some nutjob ultra-right cable show in Missouri will be getting a new presenter come July 5.