Kate Hawkesby: My final thoughts on a testing year

So it’s been a long hard year. I don’t know why this year feels harder than last year. I mean last year we had Covid for goodness sake, and lockdowns, and I guess a lot of us thought it couldn’t get much worse than this – but this year has been like a bad hangover that won’t go away. Inflation, cost of living crisis, petrol prices, housing prices, health crisis, mental health crisis, surge in crime. I mean it’s an ugly laundry list of stuff that’s made 2022 not quite the shiny new prospect many of us would have been hoping for this time last year. It feels like a bit of collective PTSD after all that Covid and politics and division and now we end the year with even more uncertainty, with things not really feeling like they’re going to get much better for a while yet. But let’s try and look at some positives. We opened our borders back up, we got tourism starting to fire back up again, we had Covid restrictions dropped, we got rid of lockdowns. See now I’m kind of running out of the positives. There’s a limited amount. Oh I know, David Seymour. As far as politicians go, he wins my politician of the year award. He brought us the art of the one liner, the great grabs, the pithy come backs and the quick ripostes. He, for a big chunk of the year,  felt like the only opposition in town. He worked hard, appeared omnipresent, and took all the push back against him in good grace, seemingly not letting it get him down. He’s less a whiner, and more a pragmatist and I like that about him. So he’s shone this year. The Government hasn’t. They’ve lost all credibility, their spin machine is so out of control they’re just spiralling into madness and if they have any credible supporters left by this time next year, I’ll be astounded. Anyone who’s awake and paying attention, and has a vested interest in news, should now be awake to the agenda at play and what is going on here. And if they’re not, they’re blind loyalist apparatchiks who are willingly choosing not to see the cold hard truth. So it’s draining isn’t it? Trying to hold people to account, trying to cover the twists and turns of the spin doctors who like to take us all on a big merry go round ride. It can wear you down. I hope though that we find some respite over the summer break, that there’s enough sunshine and downtime to feel refreshed and ready to tackle it all again next year. I’m tapping out at this point, and turning off my 3am alarm for a few weeks. Going to try and reacquaint myself with sleep. But I want to say thank you so much to all of you, our loyal listeners who I honestly do appreciate so much. You keep us on our toes; you entertain me as much as I try to entertain you. I love your feedback, your texts, your emails, your DMs on my Instagram. I would not be here, literally, without you all, so thank you for your loyal support for another year. I lost my producer this year, early starts aren’t for everyone, so thanks too to all the fill in producers I’ve had the past few months, teamwork makes the dream work. The show goes on for another two weeks, but I’ll see you back In January. In the interim, have a fabulous Christmas, stay safe, and I look forward to being back with you all in the New Year.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.