ALEXANDRA SHULMAN: Hard-fought right that Mum will never give up (2024)

The result of the local elections will have primarily been determined by oldies, since young people are more concerned about Gaza than local issues such as traffic.

Not many voters, though, will have reached the age of 97, like my mother, who was determined, despite mobility issues, to go to her polling station in Pimlico, South-West London.

And so it was that she and I embarked upon, it has to be said, a slow but important journey, about half a mile down the road.

For my mother’s generation of working women who grew up in post-war Britain, voting was a crucial part of their identity. Although last week’s mayoral and London Assembly elections were not quite at the same level as general elections, Mum felt this vote was equally important.

In 1948, when she was first eligible to vote, the memory of women gaining a hard-fought-for right was not so far distant. Women like my mother had no intention of wasting it then – or now.

The polling station was a large church, which Mum told me was famous for its candlesticks. (‘People come from all over the world to see them, darling.’)

All went fine until we had to get her and her wheelchair out of the car, on to the kerb. Why was the disability ramp pitched at an impossible gradient? It was more like a ski-lift.

Once inside, Mum experienced the patronising behaviour suffered by so many elderly people who are assumed to be unable to speak for themselves. All the questions were addressed to me rather than her, even though I suggested to the staff that they should ask Mum directly. Indeed, when she answered in her crisp, lucid voice, they should have been able to tell immediately that she was in full command of her faculties.

The church’s low lighting necessitated me having to recite the long list of candidates, including the Communist Party, Count Binface and Rejoin EU. But Mum was unflummoxed. Quickly and decisively, she put her crosses in the requisite boxes.

Her votes delivered, the journey home was hampered by my own inability to fold her wheelchair to stuff in my car. Happily, nearly half of Pimlico Road offered to help and we soon got back – both delighted by our achievement.

Mum’s vote remains private, but suffice to say I don’t think either the Conservative or Labour parties, which she has voted for variously throughout her life from the days of Churchill through Wilson, Thatcher, Blair and now Sunak, were likely beneficiaries.

Will Gaza protests trump the gala?

Tomorrow’s annual Met Ball in New York will take place a couple of miles from the massive demonstrations about Gaza at Columbia University.

It will be interesting to see if any attendees use the high-profile event as a message board, as Democrat Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did with her Tax The Rich dress in 2021. That’s if the gala isn’t disrupted by pro-Palestinian protesters across Central Park, who will no doubt be aware that many of those from the fashion and entertainment industry who take tables at the Met Ball are Jewish.

Posh’s £110 T-shirt – you’ve got to laugh

The luxury slogan T-shirt rides again. Zendaya and Josh O’Connor both wear I Told Ya T-shirts in the new tennis movie, Challengers.

The T-shirt is now a limited-edition buy from the Spanish label Loewe, where the film’s costume designer Jonathan Anderson is creative director.

It’s so popular, even at £225, that it’s probably already in danger of having peaked as a cool buy.

In which case, there are always Victoria Beckham’s slogan Ts, which include the humorous ‘David’s Wife’ and ‘My Dad Had A Rolls-Royce’, at a more affordable £110. Though no doubt there will be many who think at these prices it’s the designers who are having the last laugh.

Smart set has taken over the countryside

I've just begun reading Wives Like Us, the Cotswold satire by Plum Sykes.

If Plum is to be believed – and as a chic Gloucestershire resident and ex-Vogue writer herself I have every reason to trust her – the amount of designer labels now considered part of the area’s rich housewives’ arsenal must alone be keeping the luxury market afloat.

Chanel and Hermes shoes, Bottega Veneta jackets, Celine handbags… the name-check is as much part of the story as the insane competitiveness.

Whatever happened to the idea of the countryside being a place where you didn’t have to bother about dressing up?

During the very brief periods when I have rented a country bolthole, part of the delight was not caring about what to wear.

It was like sloughing off a dusty skin to put on the couple of sweaters and trousers left in a chest of drawers for whenever we arrived.

My country mode of dressing was inspired by a man I knew in my childhood who always wore the same pistachio cords and tweed jacket whenever he arrived for his Sussex weekends. Blissful.

Here’s one way to pay for new homes...

Last weekend, I drove to a birthday party at Cliveden in Berkshire, the infamous country house turned hotel. The route took us through miles of the most fabulous countryside, all dappled bluebell woods and swathes of green meadows. Not a new-build in sight. Just elaborate gates to the long drives of large, elegant houses.

It made me think that a tax on views, with the proceeds going to build more affordable housing, might be an idea.

Whenever a proposal is launched for additional housing in an attractive rural area, the Nimbys object – even those who theoretically applaud the idea of more affordable housing. If this influential crowd insist on keeping the unsullied views to themselves, perhaps they could be taxed for the privilege, and raise funds for well-designed projects elsewhere.

A tax on views would no doubt be unpopular with everyone who has a glorious vista to gaze out on, but it might help with our chronic urban overcrowding.