Carriages at midnight — getting home from Christmas parties feels increasingly dicey this year

It’s the shortest day of the year next week — cause for celebration in my family. One of my cousins used to send his mum flowers every winter solstice as a reminder that light was on its way. I hate darker evenings for several reasons, but particularly because it makes getting home more fraught.

Some years ago in Clapham I was mugged and punched a couple of times. In an uncharacteristic display of wits, I clocked the numberplate of the getaway car. The police caught him and his pal trying to buy a new SIM card in a nearby petrol station, raided their flat, found dozens of nicked phones and sent ’em down. But I still obsess about getting home safely at night, and last week didn’t help much.

First came a Nextdoor post about a mugging at knifepoint two streets from my flat at 9.45pm. Secondly, I heard about Katherine Jenkins intervening in a Chelsea mugging at 3.10pm before heading off to sing Silent Night at a nearby carol service.

We live in a big city and muggings are hardly unexpected, but Met cuts have been savage and headlines about knife crime continue. How brave of President Trump to visit us again last week after likening a London hospital to a “war zone” in May, on account of the rising number of stabbings. It was standard Cheeto hyperbole, yet heading home when it’s dark — especially if you’re a woman or have been mugged before — feels increasingly dicey.

Uber made a massive difference when it launched in 2012, and catching a cab became cheaper. But the firm has recently lost its London operating licence — and also released its first safety report, which contains a sobering statistic. Nearly 6,000 sexual assaults were reported during Uber journeys in the US over the past two years.

A black cab? Yeah, sure, and congratulations on recently winning the lottery. Jump on the Night Tube and you might still face a lonesome walk at the other end. Night bus? It’s not necessarily safe to loiter at a quiet bus stop. Plus, a 17-year-old has just been sentenced for his role in the homophobic attack on two women who caught the N31 in May, which left them with bloody faces. Bike? Probably not after the office party.

Earlier this year, the Citymapper app was called out by a female user for suggesting a “ropey” way home which meant she missed the last Tube and was directed down “creepy alleyways”. Some pointed out an app called Safe & The City, designed to make crossing London safer. The interface looks like a basic Google map. It suggests main routes with blue light icons alerting you to the nearest police station. Handy, but if you don’t live that near a Tube station or a bus route like me, you might still face dark streets and just hope the clack of your shoes doesn’t attract attention.

What’s the solution? I’m not sure. I like an early night but going to bed at 3pm seems extreme.

All the main parties are bleating about frontline law and order: the Tories say they’re recruiting 20,000 more police officers, Labour has pledged another 2,000 on top, and the Lib Dems claim they’re going to create a £500 million fund to tackle knife crime. So the good news is it’ll definitely start getting sorted out from Friday, right?

The women are Bond’s secret weapon

Have you seen the new James Bond trailer? It was like watching the 98th instalment of The Fast and the Furious. Guns, cars, more guns, a car with guns that extend from its headlights just like they do from Liz Hurley’s nipples in Austin Powers. Plus, a shot of Daniel Craig leaping from a bridge which looked like every other Bond stunt, and one vaguely funny line about him being shot in the knee which we might attribute to Phoebe Waller-Bridge.

The film is out in April, so brace yourselves for months of build-up and rumours that the new female 007, Londoner Lashana Lynch, pictured, will take over as the lead from Craig.

All right, Bond is Bond, and what more can one expect than guns, cars and women in dresses slashed to their knickers? But I find our ongoing obsession with the franchise weird. Barely a day goes by without a headline guessing who the new Bond will be — Richard Madden? Idris Elba? Brian Blessed?

I have a vague notion that people find the idea of Bond comforting — a posh, macho, British spy proving that we’re still an unbeatable world power. It’s depressing. Make it stop.

Posting votes on social media

Am I being wimpy by not posting who I’m voting for on social media? I’ve been observing it around me; trendy fashion sorts posting selfies of themselves with a political caption and changing their profile pictures to incorporate party insignia. People I would previously have assumed might not have been able to pick the Prime Minister out of a line-up are suddenly policy experts on Instagram.

It’s partly that I still haven’t decided. I’ve voted Labour more often than I’ve voted Tory and I daresay I’ll change my mind multiple times in the next three days, but I can’t imagine posting my decision online as a form of virtue-signalling.