(Image credit:
Fisher King Publishing)
A couple of weeks ago, I chanced on a video by Winston
Marshall, in which he interviewed Bernadette (Bernie) Spofforth: [[1]].
They talked about many things: free speech, migration, her arrest for a 2024 tweet
about the Southport murderer, digital ID, the collapsing UK economy, the ways
in which governments of all parties strive to control us, the dishonesty of
politicians, and the role of the United Nations in all this. And she mentioned
a book she had published, in June 2026, on these subjects: [[2]].
Now, having been trained long ago as a mathematician, I have
since become a libertarian writer, a self-taught ethical and political
philosopher, something of a historian – particularly in environmental matters –
and also campaign manager for my local branch of Reform UK. As well as a member
of the civil liberties organization Together, and former deputy leader of its
local group. And I have written about many of the same issues Bernie addresses.
So, unsurprisingly, I was interested in this book, published
by Fisher King: [[3]].
I determined to write a review of it as soon as I could. This is the result.
Initial impressions
It is a brick of a book – 455 pages. It took me about 17
hours, spread over four days, to read it through and make notes. Fortunately,
the weather was generally dry and warm, so I was able to do most of the work sitting
on benches overlooking my local lake.
First impression: I enjoyed the back-cover blurb, introducing
the book as: “Fearless, frightening, funny and fiercely analytical.” And being
strongly opposed to AI, I appreciated the “Human Author” graphic on the reverse
of the frontispiece.
As to the author: She has had a varied career in business.
Of the eight UK companies of which she has been a director, three are still
active. That’s good in the current climate. Swimwear – not exactly an interest
of mine – seems to have been the main theme recently. But as the book intimates,
she has changed career since 2024. It looks as if she has used her arrest, and its
aftermath, to re-shape herself into an investigative journalist.
The book
After the Prologue, which (with a fair degree of emotion) recounts
Bernie’s arrest and what followed, the book is in three Parts. Part One, The
Machine Is Built, charts the rise of the globalist empire that, day by day, seeks
to enslave us all more and more to the whims of its unaccountable élite. Part Two, The Age
of Control, is the “meat” of the book, exploring the many different ways in
which that empire seeks to control us. Part Three, sadly too short in my
opinion, addresses Collapse, Consequence and Resistance.
It is my wont, when I review a text and particularly like
something I find, to quote verbatim the text that pleases me. So, I will
begin at the end, and give you this: “Now the time for silence from all of us
is over. The time to speak truth to power, just as Socrates did, has come. It’s
time to live again.”
Amen.
Part One – The Machine Is Built
The UN
Bernie begins with a bolt against the major enemy of
humanity today – the United Nations.
I already knew a lot of what is in this chapter. I knew, for
example, that the UN has been the driving force behind the green and anti-human
agenda, that has been destroying our rights and freedoms since the 1970s. In
fact, I have written an essay called “Our Enemy, the UN.”
But I didn’t know about the 2019 Strategic Partnership
Framework with the World Economic Forum (WEF), whose purpose was “to accelerate
the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.” A good
catch, Bernie.
The Population Problem
I am well aware of the UN’s role in fanning the replacement
migration agenda since 2000, and have written about it myself. But I didn’t
know about the book “The Population Problem,” edited by Stanley Johnson,
Boris’s father. Another good catch.
The Club of Rome
Two quotes worth repeating. “Crises weren’t problems to
solve; they were tools to engineer a common global goal.” And “Government of
the many, for the few, by the few.” Moreover, a question: Is it a coincidence
that the UN’s “Sustainable Development Goals” and the “Paris Agreement” were signed
in the same year, 2015?
The Megaphone
I didn’t before know about the 2018 Global Media Compact, which
described itself as “a new drive to advance awareness of the Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs).” In 2018 and 2019, the UN was hard at work promoting
its agenda!
Stakeholder capitalism
I share Bernie’s revulsion against “stakeholder capitalism.”
She is spot on with her criticisms, and her assignment of much of the blame to
the WEF. Whose “programmes have ended up giving far greater influence to global
corporations and large NGOs than to ordinary citizens.”
The Head of the Snake
Ah, ECOSOC. “Fullthinkers unbellyfeel ECOSOC,” as I have said
elsewhere. This is, indeed, the hub which co-ordinates all the bad things the
UN is doing to us.
CRAG and Quangos
Perhaps the most startling revelation in the whole book is the
story of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act (CRAG). This bill was a
parting shot from Gordon Brown in April 2010.
“CRAG handed ministers a simple mechanism to ratify
international treaties and related agreements… with only a brief and largely
passive form of parliamentary oversight.” Section 20(4) of the bill explicates this:
[[4]]. Yet
the Coalition on taking office, instead of scrapping or amending the bill,
continued to implement it. That is evidence that all UK governments of recent
decades are, in effect, all one party – the Uniparty. Or is it UNiparty?
This chapter also introduces “quangos.” Implementing the
more contentious UK government policies is often done by unelected
non-departmental bodies, called quangos. They operate “at arm’s length” from
ministers, and so are not directly accountable to parliament. Quangos are
supposed to be strictly impartial; but many are quite the opposite. The book
gives some good examples, such as Ofcom and the Climate Change Committee (CCC).
Put together the bypassing of parliamentary scrutiny using CRAG,
and the implementation of bad policies – including those coming from the UN and
EU – by activist quangocrats with a mission to force them on us against our
wills, and you have a nightmare. For all of us.
Democracy
“The truth us that democracy has always been more illusion
than reality.” Yes, indeed. But myself, I’ll go with Emma Goldman: “If voting
changed anything, they'd make it illegal.”
Besides which, a system in which ten people can gang up to
tell nine people how they must behave is not going to be sustainable for very
long!
Religion
I’m an agnostic, so when Bernie talks of environmentalism
looking like a kind of “substitute religion,” I think she understates her case.
For me, environmentalism is a religion: I dub it “Gaianity.” And like
Christianity, I find it empty. Although I have searched for such things, I have
found no more hard, objective evidence proving that there is a “climate crisis”
or a “nature crisis,” than there is hard evidence proving the existence of a god.
Part Two – The Age of Control
Part Two of the book is full of detail.
The SDGs
This chapter gives a decent overview of each of the
Sustainable Development Goals.
I was rather surprised not to find any mention of air
quality under SDG 11, since it is referenced in 11.6 (in the context of cities).
For this is one of the two major excuses (the other being “safety”) that national
and local governments of all the mainstream parties have been using in order to
restrict our freedom to drive. Even outside cities.
“There you have it. The goals no one ever really talked to
you about in detail; the laws no one discussed with you; and Agenda 2030,
adopted in 2015 by UN member states including the UK. I believe these are the
central reasons we are in the state we are in today. Almost all roads lead back
to the UN and its goals.” That is spot on.
Climate and Nett Zero
Having some expertise in this area, I can say that Bernie
Spofforth understands pretty well what is going on there. And she sums up with:
“The science is never really ‘settled,’ but the funding always seems to be. And
money, in the end, is the root of all control.”
Seeds and Crops
“If you control the seed, you control the farmer. If you
control the farmer, you control the food. And if you control the food, you
control the people.” Thank you, Mrs Orwell.
Land
“In the United States, the land grab looks different, but
the outcome is identical: fewer farmers, bigger corporations, and plenty of
farmland being converted into anything but food.”
The Illusion of Choice
“Small producers often can’t comply with the hefty new
regulations and policy frameworks tied to Agenda 2030.” And: “It always comes
down to the same thing: consolidation, centralisation and profit at the expense
of our freedom.” Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
Energy
“The Paris agreement… also opened a new money stream
potentially worth trillions in subsidies, carbon markets and green bonds.”
Indeed.
“Without oil, humanity cannot exist as it does now.” True,
and raises the question: what are the ulterior motives of those that want to
phase out the use of fossil fuels?
She concludes the “Solar Energy” chapter by describing solar
power – rightly – as “a shiny scam dressed up as earthly salvation.”
As to wind: “The true cost of wind power is carefully hidden
behind a façade of propaganda, while the UK drowns in debt to banks and
investors. And those same banks and investors are the ones profiting. Always.”
The Funding of the Unproven
In this chapter, I was impressed by Bernie’s ability to get
over the essence of highly technical subjects without using too many numbers. I
was surprised to hear of the 2017 “Clean Growth Strategy” for “Britain’s low
carbon future” – I had not realized that these ideas were in circulation that early.
Bernie also raises concerns about bad side-effects of nett
zero boondoggles such as carbon capture and storage. Even if they had no side-effects,
these would still demand “massive public investment in projects that deliver
little or nothing for ordinary people, but plenty for the firms being
subsidised or funded.”
Land, Oceans and Nature Control
In this chapter – which also covers waste – Bernie looks at
the way in which our world is “being wrestled away from the many by the few
global organisations you have never voted for, under the guise of ‘climate
change’ and ‘saving the planet.’” Not to mention “biodiversity net gain” and
similar ruses. And the World Health Organization (WHO) is getting in on the
act, too.
Moreover: “The ‘clean’ revolution comes at a very dirty
cost.” “The entire foundation of the ‘green revolution’ rests on a dirty,
dangerous, geopolitically complex industry with massive environmental and human
costs.” And: “This isn’t saving the planet.” It’s strip-mining it in the name
of climate virtue.”
And to finish: “When they talk about the cost of living,
remember this: the entire green industrial revolution is being funded by you.”
That, forsooth, is why the poor are getting ever poorer, while the rich and their
politically connected cronies get ever richer.
Control of the People
This chapter is a monster – 96 pages. I confess I sometimes
found it hard to keep up my concentration. I think it needs to be divided into
more manageable chunks.
It begins uncompromisingly: “The biggest barrier to the
delivery of a new world order through the global implementation of Agenda 2030
is us. It was always going to be so. And I think they knew that.” Yes, indeed.
Bernie describes the structure supporting SDG activists as
“a professionalised ecosystem of grants, media training, and legal cover, able
to mobilise busloads of people with identical placards far faster than any
grassroots protest ever could.”
She points out that harmless-sounding SDG targets like
“integrated city policies” have led to “surveillance cameras, ULEZ-style
charging zones, smart meters, and building codes that force upgrades before you
can even rent it out.” And mean that only suppliers with the right ESG or Nett
Zero paperwork will get contracts, so small firms who cannot comply will be
shut out.
She devotes many pages to the role of the WHO in all this.
And she expands on what has been done to us using Brown’s CRAG bill: “‘Best
practice’ written by unelected bodies can become law in the UK with nothing but
a tweak to secondary legislation… It is laid before overwhelmed MPs for 21
days, and if no one notices or objects, decisions shaped by quangos simply pass
into law in all but name.” Shameful. And it’s been going on for 16 years now.
She assembles many different threads into what starts to
look suspiciously like a rope. The prevalence of “smart” technologies. (To me,
“smart” means “a sharp, stinging pain.”) The UN’s Global Digital Compact – “the
policy umbrella under which identity-centric access to online and virtual
services can spread.” The five-step process used to suppress those who tell
inconvenient truths, exposed in plain language for all to see.
There is a very substantial section on globalism versus
religion. She talks of “increasing numbers of people praying to the god of
Mother Nature.” (I did tell you I call that religion “Gaianity!”) But I do have
a philosophical difference with Bernie here. Like her, I come to ethics from a
natural law perspective. But as an agnostic, I do not accept that natural law requires
a deity – whether Jahweh, Allah, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
For me, the natural law of humanity comes from inside us –
from our nature as human beings. And it can be summed up in a famous phrase by
John Locke: “being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in
his life, health, liberty or possessions.” So, I see the natural law, which
governs right and wrong, as a core morality, which is independent of culture or
religion. If the rules of two cultures or religions are both compatible with
that core morality, there should be no problem for people of both to live
together.
As I see it, the UN’s agenda to impose a one-size-fits-all
framework goes far beyond the core morality, and includes many things that far too
easily lead to violations of core rights and freedoms. (By the way, I dub the
UN’s religion “UNanimity.” Everyone parrots the UN agenda all together).
Under the heading of Digital ID, Bernie asks an excellent
question: “Why do you think we need all that AI capacity?” Part of her answer
is, in essence, mine: To run the social (dis-) credit algorithms. Truly frightening.
Under “AI – The Mad Bit,” she says much about the problems
which AI is certain to cause all of us. But she seems to miss the most
important issue of all: AI makes mistakes. And the damage from trusting such a
mistake, to you or others or both, will often be far more than it would have
cost to get the job done yourself in the first place.
At the very end of this monster of a chapter, we find: “It
seems that through the ages, as humankind has progressed, there have always
been the humans that want to shape or control and those who will embrace it. Ah,
you’re thinking to yourself, we can just ignore all this and refuse to do as
they want. You’re right, you can. Which is why they’re tightening the controls
behind the scenes. You didn’t think they’d back off, did you?” Ah yes, the
psychopaths.
Money as Control
If the previous chapter didn’t chill your blood, this one
will. “Money is the whip of power. It decides what you can own, how far you
travel, and the kind of life you have. What used to sit with the individual has
drifted to the state.” And its cronies, of course. Power is concentrated in
“central banks, global regulators, and a handful of giant asset managers.” And
money “has become a privilege, not a possession.”
But when Bernie starts to talk about debt, our points of
view diverge. She talks of the national debt as “our” debt. But it’s not my
debt. Or your debt. It is the state’s debt. The state today is
all but financially bankrupt. And completely morally bankrupt. The
solution is obvious. To get rid of the debt problem (and a lot more besides), get
rid of the state!
Tightening the Net
I’d call it tightening the noose myself. But we’re thinking
along the same lines. The UN is still blasting full speed ahead with “pacts”
and “summits,” every one of them going against the interests, rights and
freedoms of us human beings. And the traitors to humanity, that call themselves
governments, keep on going along and agreeing to them. While forever tightening
around our necks the noose of the agendas they’ve previously agreed to. All this
must stop.
“If you don’t start taking notice of the bullshit happening
all around you, challenge it, speak out against it, and actively fight it,
then, like a choking fog, it will envelop us all.” Yes. The light of day, and
the energy it brings us, are the best disinfectants.
Dissent
“Without dissent, truth itself dies, because when no one is
allowed to question, the only version of reality left is the one approved by
the state.”
“It’s not about protecting people, it’s about protecting
narratives.”
“They cannot let Agenda 2030 fail; there is far too much
money and control at stake.”
Indeed.
Part Three – Collapse, Consequence and Resistance
I’ll repeat: this part of the book is (far) too short!
Decline
“Every system eventually consumes itself.” Well, every empire,
at least. Raising four questions: How to push the process along? What to build
in its place? How to manage the transition? How to survive into the new world?
A Fork – It Can’t be Both
“Imagine a government brave enough to say ‘to hell with it,
we’re starting again.’ And a majority that agrees.” Why else did I become a
Reform UK campaign manager? But I’m concerned that we may end up needing a
knife, as well as a fork.
“We really are such dickheads.” Two thoughts. One, don’t
disparage yourself, Bernie. You aren’t a dickhead, as this book proves.
And two, who’s “we?”
“What has taken seventy years to create may take another
thirty to dismantle.” That’s far too slow for me personally (I’m 73). I think
it can be done a lot quicker, but we’d have to be totally ruthless towards our
enemies, which they deserve after what they’ve done to us.
The “all is lost” moment
I was rather disappointed by the final chapter. I hoped to
see something about how we re-build after the Revolution. That’s another
chapter or several! A hint: Wirtschaftswunder.
I also understand that, probably to avoid censorship and
personal risks, Bernie has skipped the three chapters before that. How we start
the Revolution. How we conduct it. And how old codgers like me can survive it.
In conclusion
Every good book meets the needs of its time. “A War to Win
Back Your World” is exactly the kind of book we need right now. We are at a
point in human history where we need a Revolution (and not just a political
one). Bernie Spofforth has written a book that is Revolutionary, in the best
sense.
There are, of course, a few rough edges. But I sense that this
book has potential to trigger a change of mind-set in a significant proportion of
the people who read it. And if you feel that change, you will surely want to
recommend the book to your friends. I like to think it will become
Revolutionary in another sense, too: what goes around, comes around!
As it moves through the population, this mind-set change
will build opposition to the United Nations, its “Sustainable Development
Goals,” its other agendas, and all those that have promoted, supported or
sought to enforce any of its agendas. Including every UK government of all
parties since at least the 1980s, and all the government, quango, activist, banker,
corporate and big-business, plutocrat, and other cronies that Bernie identifies
in her book.
I thoroughly recommend this book. Six stars out of five! Buy it before they ban it!
