SARAH VINE: Forget tariffs... it's a proper crisis when the tills break down at our beloved M&S!

Daily Mail​

23-04-2025

Forget the ravens in the Tower of London. Forget the King asleep in his cave and the eagles circling the mountain top. The surest sign that the Kingdom is in mortal peril is the news that the tills stopped working at Marks & Spencer over the Easter weekend.
As portents of doom go, this must surely be a serious one. The Pope may be dead, but what about the fact that in Bexleyheath shoppers can't use their contactless cards? Did Nostradamus mention this in his Les Propheties? He might have done.
'And on the day of the Risen Christ / In the year of our Lord two thousand and twenty-five/ the tillers of Spencer and Marc shalt fayle and fall silent / And the people will be refused their three-pack loin coverings and porcine confectionery / And verily Sparks will fly.' Chilling.
The panic was palpable. There was righteous anger on social media. 'I've tried to return some clothing to the Camden store and have been told that your wi-fi has been down company-wide since Saturday so I can't return them,' fumed one customer. Another: 'Went to @marksandspencer did a full food shop only to be told that I can't use contactless. Heading to Waitrose now instead.'
Some reported apocalyptic scenes: 'In a queue with ten customers at @marksandspencer, I was the only person remaining when they announced that their contactless service was not working on their card machine.' (Which begs the question: what happened to the others?)
Yet another: 'When you drive 20 minutes for breakfast at the cafe but there's a company-wide issue, contactless isn't working and they decide to close the cafe.'
Setting aside the fact that driving 20 minutes to find breakfast in a supermarket cafe seems a little excessive, the strength of feeling at what is, after all, a fairly minor inconvenience, offers an interesting insight into the importance of Marks & Spencer in the national conscience.
Or, to coin a phrase, this isn't just any technical glitch, this is an M&S technical glitch.
No store, not even John Lewis, comes close to Marks and Sparks in the hearts of British shoppers.
It is as quintessentially British as the Royal Family, rain-lashed beaches and endless cups of milky tea. It is the closest we have these days to a national identity we all share.
It also – despite the occasional hiccup – represents quality, reliability, consistency. No wonder the general public was so freaked out by this meltdown. In an uncertain and troubling world, M&S stands as a beacon of stability against the wild seas of misfortune (and, let's face it, those seas have been quite wild of late).
Everything else may be crashing down around our heads, but so long as you can get a prawn sandwich and a packet of Percy Pigs from M&S, all is well.
It's civilisation. The Greeks invented democracy, the Romans devised the aqueducts, we built Marks and Sparks. Indeed, growing up in Rome, my mother's first port of call on trips home was always M&S.
The flagship store in Oxford Street was her favourite: she once disappeared for five hours into its comforting embrace, stocking up on pyjamas and underwear to take back with her. I found her in the food hall buying all the raspberry jellies (her favourite).
Her mother was the same. My grandfather had strict instructions for the weekly shop. The basics were to be obtained from Sainsbury's. But the important groceries – real fruit juice, certain vegetables, quiche and good apples – were to be procured strictly at Marks.
They were eked out during the week, small slices of delicious luxury. Even now, when I'm feeling a bit discombobulated, I find a trip to Marks soothing. The clothes are neither too cheap nor too expensive, neither too fashion forward nor too frumpy. Some years they're better than others (this year is an especially good one) but, overall, the quality is consistent. One of the oldest items of clothing I own is a wool cape I bought there in the Nineties; my daughter recently discovered it and won't stop wearing it.
Marks and Sparks caters for everyone – tall, short, fat, thin, old, young. But at its essence its secret is simple: affordable quality. But also trust, reliability, a fair price for a good product – in other words, old-fashioned British values.
Better get those tills fixed, guys; we don't want a revolution.
There should be plenty of sympathy for Marianne
It seems rather sad that Marianne Faithfull – singer, model, rock 'n' roll muse and the inspiration for Rolling Stones classics such as Wild Horses and You Can't Always Get What You Want – died leaving assets worth just £35,000.
For a few years she was instrumental to the image of the band and its leading man, Mick Jagger. Indeed, arguably the Stones would not have been so successful were it not for the glamour her bohemian lifestyle lent them.
One of their most famous songs, Sympathy For The Devil, was inspired by The Master And Margarita, a novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, which Faithfull introduced Jagger to – and yet what thanks did she get?
Hers is a tale familiar to so many women who give their all to support the men they love then somehow find themselves with no one to turn to in their hour of need.
I understand that Prince Andrew is a problematic character for the Royal Family, but I really don't see why this has any bearing on his right to attend church with them at Easter. Indeed, I would have thought that if anything, he should be encouraged to atone for his sins.
Now that we finally have clarity on the definition of a woman, can we please stop using the term 'cis'? It's ugly, derogatory – and, crucially, redundant.
Males who mark their territory with urine are common in the animal kingdom. I thought humans were more sophisticated – but judging by the actions of trans protesters last week, apparently not. Cries of 'we pee where we want' and 'I love p***ing on Terfs' accompanied footage of activists in a ladies' loo, aggressively chanting 'Where we do our business is none of your business!' As someone who has owned several male pets, I'm afraid there's only one cure for this kind of behaviour. A quick trip to the vet should fix it.
Following Newsnight's decision to almost completely ignore last week's Supreme Court ruling on the definition of a woman, the BBC's comedy show, Have I Got News For You, failed to mention it at all – despite it being the leading news item of the week. You might have thought that, as seasoned satirists, show regulars Paul Merton and Ian Hislop and their guests – including Julian Clary, who is known for his waspish wit – would have mined the comedy seam of the highest court in the land being forced to state the bleeding obvious. But no, not a peep.
Why do we fund band's sick stunt?
Whatever you think of the Israel/Palestine conflict, projecting 'Free Palestine, F**k Israel' on stage at a music festival is at best offensive, at worst an endorsement of terrorist acts given the atrocities committed on October 7, 2023. That is what the band Kneecap chose to do at Coachella. This is the group given £14,250 of arts funding at the behest of this Government – after the Tories tried to block it. Should taxpayers' money really be going to supporters of terrorists?