May 2005 Archives

We have made it into Tim Worstall's increasingly popular weekly Britblog Roundup #14

"Blairwatch is outraged at the UK’s failure to sign the agreement on trafficking in humans, NuLabour follows up with further details."

The Sunday Times hints at the Channel 4 TV programme "Dispatches Investigation: The Dirty Tricks Election", due to be broadcast this Monday 23rd May 2005, at 20:00, (no details yet on their website):

"Meanwhile, the Labour party is braced for criticism over dirty tricks during the election. A Channel 4 Dispatches programme will tell of an undercover reporter’s experiences inside Labour HQ during the election.

Jenny Kleeman will reveal how fake letters were sent to local newspapers to show support for Labour’s achievements. She will also describe how Alan Milburn, the campaign co-ordinator, and Campbell used to “high five” in the middle of the office.

"I witnessed extraordinary examples of the kind of foul-mouthed bullying and everyday mendacity that are the common currency of Labour’s male-dominated media organisation," she said."

The Observer goes into more detail:

"How Labour used its election troops to fake popular support

Documentary shows activists writing letters to newspapers and posing as 'local people' to greet Blair on campaign trail

The Sunday Telegraph has an article debunking Home Secretary Charles Clarke's interview on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, where he made claims about existing "uniforms" for youth offenders doing Community Service.

They charactarise his performance as:

"Six falsehoods in 100 seconds: how the Home Secretary misled public over 'yob crackdown'"

By Melissa Kite and Patrick Hennessy
(Filed: 22/05/2005)

An elaborate account by the Home Secretary, Charles Clarke, of the tough measures the Government is allegedly imposing on young offenders was a sham, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.

Although Guido Fawkes has a theory about how the dubious NuLabour election emails, some, apparently with tracking "web bugs" hidden in the HTML code (for those dim enough to allow their email software to automatically display them), we have to agree with Talk Politics that, unfortunately, there are enough exemptions in the Data Protection Act 1998 to make it pretty useless in the case of someone who has knowingly signed up to be sent political emails from NuLabour.

Thankfully, not having received any NuLabour email spam, someone else will have to determine if any of the NuLabour election emails were sent via, say, email servers in the USA, in which case, given the Labour Party's Data Protection Register entry, it would be in breach of the Data Protection Act, as they claim not to send personal data outside of the European Economic Area. However, yet again, there is implied consent, if you signed up for political emails to be sent to, for example, your USA based hotmail or aol account.

This also applies equally to any other political party, and also, for example to the intelligence insulting junk snail mail we got, from the Conservatives, despite having opted out of the "let's sell this personal data to direct marketing companies" full Electoral Roll.

The several Conservative Campaign Headquarters junk letters supposedly "personally" from Michael Howard, were not addressesd in quite same way as the single local constituency generated junk letter, which stuck to the name and address format as it appears on the Electoral Roll. The NuLabour and the Liberal Democrat constituency generated junk mail also stuck to the Electoral Roll name address format.

The NuLabour Home Office seems to be spinning anonymously again, with an extraordinary claim about the Council of Europe Convention on action against trafficking in human beings, which John Prescott failed to sign on behalf of the United Kingdom at the COE Summit in Warsaw this week.

Apparently, according to this politics.co.uk report:

"A Home Office spokesman expressed support for the aims of the convention, but warned: "There are certain provisions which present difficulties for the UK and which remain under active consideration. The Convention contains measures which we believe may actively encourage people traffickers and may place more vulnerable victims at risk. We want to resolve these issues before taking a decision on signature."

The claim that this international convention, which seeks to give a few minimum rights to the victims of the sex slave trade, is somehow likely to actively encourage this evil trade is astonishing, and it must be justified by a public statement from a Home Office Minister, in detail.

What does it take for the "Westminster village" of both NuLabour and weedy Opposition politicians and journalists to wake up and take notice of this issue, which is happening under their noses right here in the United Kingdom ?

Thanks again to Blairwatch for bringing this to our attention.

The NuLabour legislative onslaught outlined in the Queen's speech has started.

The misnamed Equality Bill, introduced in the House of Lords on 18th May, sets out to create a Super Quasi-Autonomous Non-Governmental Organisation or Non-Departmental Public Body called the Commission for Equality and Human Rights, which will replace the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Commission for Racial Equality, and the Disability Rights Commission

If the new body had more power to affect Government policies before they are forced into law, than the quangos it will replace, or if it had a strong enforcement role and budget, then this might be a welcome move.
However, this does not seem to be the case.

Instead, it appears that the NuLabour plan is to further weaken any oversight of the Government or its tentacles of state, whilst paying lip service to allegedly "progressive" politics.

In particular the "Equality Bill" is also sneaking in complicated and controversial "Religous Discrimination / Harassment" powers which were could have a similar "chilling effect" on free speech, as the "Incitement to Religous Hatred" clauses which were removed from the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act during its passage through Parliament.

Presumably this is why the White Paper and Consultation on the creation of the Commission for Equality and Human Rights was originally done by the Department of Trade and Industry, but this so called "Equality Bill" is a product of the Home Office kremlin.

Note the vast number of exemptions for anything to do with National Security or the Criminal Justice system, or indeed any other function or duty of Ministers, which seem to be designed specifically to prevent this new legislation being used to uphold any complaints of Religous Discrimination against the very public bodies which are the most likely to have such complaints made against them.
e.g. people from Catholic or Islamic minorities who complain about the attitude of the authorities towards them, especialy with regards to alleged anti-terrorism stops and searches.

Lumping in "Human Rights" into this new Commission, will probably lead to Tony Blair yet again claiming that there are "no human rights or civil liberties" issues to worry about in the rest of the NuLabour legislative programme, such as the controversial ID Cards Bill.

John Prescott has been representing the UK at the Council of Europe Summit in Warsaw.

As predicted, NuLabour have not signed up for Council of Europe Convention on action against trafficking in human beings, which attempts to give some minimum rights to the mostly women and children who are victims of the sex slave trade, but NuLabour have signed us up for more repressive "anti-terrorism" laws instead.

It seems that Tony Blair and his Downing Street advisors managed to forget to appoint a Minister for Women's Issues.
The Scotsman reports:

"Also fuelling talk of Mr Blair’s fallibility has been his shambolic government reshuffle. In the latest embarrassment, it emerged that Downing Street last week "forgot" to name a minister for women. And the eventual recipient, Meg Munn, has been asked to do the job without the benefit of a ministerial salary."

Megg Munn is Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Women and Equality at the re-re-named DTI, "supporting" Rt. Hon. Alan Johnson, Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, on equality issues.

However she also seems to have a John Birt managment conultant speak "dotted line" on the Cabinet organogram to Rt. Hon. Tessa Jowell, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, on women’s issues.

Following on from all the hype about "hoodies" and to a lesser extent, baseball caps last week, The Guardian reports that

"Uniforms for young offenders 'not policy'

Alan Travis, home affairs editor
Monday May 16, 2005
The Guardian

New proposals to make young offenders wear US-style uniforms while carrying out community punishments appeared to be heading the same way as Tony Blair's shelved plan to make yobs pay on-the-spot fines by marching them to cashpoints.

The Home Office minister Hazel Blears who is responsible for dealing with anti-social behaviour, floated the idea yesterday in a newspaper interview as a way of ensuring that justice was seen to be done in the battle against the "culture of disrespect"."

The Sunday Times has led their front page with a bit of a non-story about Lord Drayson's former use of offshore tax havens - what do they expect from a multi-millionaire who employs professional tax advisors ? Don't Rupert Murdoch or some of the Sunday Times staff also do this ?

Remember our first reaction to his appointment ?

"Ministry of Defence
Parliamentary Secretary
Lord Drayson (unpaid)

Paul Drayson, a businessman, whose ennoblement was already controversial due to his apparent donations of over £500,000 to the NuLabour party, and whose company PowderJect managed to secure a £32 million Government contract for smallpox vaccine, awarded without it being put out to competitive tender. Allegedly this was because PowderJect had managed to contractually sew up the capacity of the actual pharmceutical company producing the vaccine with an ironclad contract."

However the figure that the Sunday Times quote for his donations to the Labour Party is £1.1 million. Guido Fawkes also comments on these donations.

"Why has this man appeared as a Junior Ministry of Defence Minister ?"

Well, the good news is, that according to his potted Ministerial Biography, he has a BSc(Hons) in Production engineering and a PhD in Robotics, which must be a good thing given the complexity of modern warfare.

The bad news is that he has been appointed Under Secretary of State and Minister for Defence Procurement !

No wonder his position is unpaid ! How many billions will he be able to make once he leaves office, with his detailed inside knowledge of massive Defence contracts ?

By not taking a salary, do the normal rules for ex-Ministers and conflicts of interest apply ?

The Sunday Times reports:

"New road safety minister was fined three times for speeding

Dipesh Gadher, Transport Correspondent
Sunday Times, 15 May 2005

THE government’s new road safety minister came close to being disqualified from driving after he was caught speeding three times within three years.

Stephen Ladyman, who was appointed last week, has admitted that at one stage he had accumulated nine penalty points on his driving licence. If he had been caught speeding for a fourth time — adding a further three points — he would have faced an automatic ban.

Ladyman, who is deputy to Alistair Darling, the transport secretary, oversees roads policy and is tasked with ensuring the safe passage of a road safety bill through parliament. The bill, which ran out of time before the general election was called, will be reintroduced in the Queen’s speech this week."

What a fine example our NuLabour political leaders are setting for the rest of us !

The Sunday Telegraph reports that James Purnell, the new Minister for Media and Tourism, wrote a sensible, if critical article, about the 2012 Olympic Games bid back in 2003 for The Times, See the Mayor of London Blog for more comments.

"It is a shame that there is not an Olympic event for "political backpedalling", as the Minister for Tourism seems to be a potential Gold medallist."

It is also very revealing, that the article critical of the London bid, was written for The Times in 2003. The Sunday Telegraph has put their report about this article at the top of their front page, but the Rupert Murdoch owned Times newspaper either did not notice the implications of their own article when the Ministerial appointments were announced, or there is some sort of Murdoch or NuLabour media manipulation going on.

Will the original article get censored from The Times online archive (paid subscription only) ?

Blairwatch via UK Political Blog aggregate feed points to the Channel 4 News story, which claims that the NuLabour Government seems likely not to sign up and ratify the Council of Europe Convention Against Trafficking

UK 'will not protect sex slaves'

Published: 13 May 2005
By: Sarah Smith

Channel Four news has learned that the government will not sign a piece of European legislation that guarantees the rights of victims. Sarah Smith reports."

The media leaks ahead of the Queen's Speech seem to have started, as one has come to expect of NuLabour's contempt for Parliament.

According to the London Evening Standard:

"Blair steams ahead with 40 new Bills
By Joe Murphy, Evening Standard
12 May 2005

A mammoth Queen's Speech containing 40 controversial Bills was agreed by the Cabinet today as Tony Blair set out to prove his leadership has not run out of steam.
The 18-month programme of new legislation is being seen by ministers as a "virility test" of Labour's reduced Commons majority of 67.

Downing Street strategists believe the plans, topped by ID cards and a new clampdown on costly red tape, will herald a series of set-piece confrontations with Left-wingers hostile to Mr Blair's leadership."

Rubbish ! The NuLabour Government's ID card and centralised biometric database plans are the epitome of expemsive, bureaucratic, big government red-tape !

The aim is to demonstrate that the Prime Minister's authority is intact by defeating those who are agitating for an early transfer of power to Gordon Brown.

40 Bills ! This implies the usual NuLabour tactic of rushing through legislation, which even their own supporters have to concedem is usually full of badly draughted clauses, which do not get debated or amended properley by Parliament. Presumably they will continue with their usual contempt for Parliament by withholding letters, reports and documents, relevant to the heavily curtailed debates, from Members of Parliament, until the very last minute, perhaps even only releasing them during the debates themselves, as was done with the Mental Capacity, the Identity Cards and the Prevention of Terrorism Bills.

The full list, which was being set out at the first Cabinet meeting since the general election, will be unveiled in the Queen's Speech on Tuesday. It is set to include:

The Financial Times reports the confusion and ineptitude over the name of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) which was renamed to the Department for Productivity, Energy and Industry (DPEI) only last week, but now seems to already re-re-branding itself back to the DTI.

This issue should provide a quick litmus test of whether or not the Opposition will be as ineffective as they were in the last Parliament.

Will any Opposition MPs even bother to ask, let alomne get answers to questions like:

The Guardian reports on a whole raft of NuLabour spin doctors and unelected, unaccountable political commissars who will, no doubt, continue meddling in various policy areas.

These people are neither civil servants nor elected politicians. How do we know that they are not in the pay of vested interests and lobbyists ?

The NuLabour spin machine is spinning the line to the uncritical media (e.g. The Guardian and BBC) that Beverly Hughes somehow "unwittingly" mislead Parliament over the Romanian and Bulgarian visa scandal which led to her resignation from the Home Office in disgrace.

The incompetence of both Beverly Hughes and her boss David Blunkett in not managing the Immigration and Nationality Directorate of the Home Office, and the lack of proper internal management for which they were directly responsible, can be seen from the account by the whistleblower Steve Moxon in his book The Great Immigration Scandal. The "shoot the messenger" treatment of the whistleblower Steve Moxon and of the British Consul in Bucharest James Cameron by the NuLabour Ministers and the Civil Service is also
a disgrace.

Why was Tony Blair not representing the United Kingdom at the Victory in Europe Day Anniversary in Moscow ? Why was he not there in person, amongst all the other leaders of the Western World, sending John Prescott instead, who was then humiliatingly relegated to the fourth rank of the official photo ?

It is not as if the Moscow event was not known about months and years ahead of time. Surely the decisions about Junior Ministers could easily have waited another couple of days ?

The full post election Cabinet has now been announced, and there are some controversial appointments at the Junior Minister level:

Department for Education and Skills
Minister of State (Children)
The Rt Hon Beverly Hughes MP for Stretford and Urmston is the disgraced ex-Home Office Minister who had to resign over the immigration scandal involving Romanian and Bulgarian visas exposed by whistleleblowers Steve Moxon and James Cameron.

Beverly Hughes takes over from The Rt Hon Margaret Hodge MBE MP for Barking, whose disregard for Data Protection and Privacy worries about her controversial "Big Nanny Database" Children Act does not bode well for future policy in her new postition as Minister of State (Work) under the authoratarian technological illiterate David Blunkett at the Department for Work and Pensions.

Department for Education and Skills
Parliamentary Secretary
Lord Adonis

Andrew Adonis was, until today, simply a NuLabour political commissar, with the ear of the Prime Minister's office, and not even a Member of Parliament, which is why he has been ennobled so that he can serve as a Junior Minister. he was responsible for dreaming up amd meddling with the implementation of the City Acadamies, which waste vast sums of public money. handed over to private companies, who are also allowed to brainwash the children with their own products and meddle with the curriculum to include rubbish like Creationism, and who can decide to sell off assets like buildings or playing firlds for their own profit.

What right has he to be literally now lording it over Education policy ?

Ministry of Defence
Parliamentary Secretary
Lord Drayson (unpaid)

Pual Drayson, a businessman, whose ennoblement was already controversial due to his apparent donations of over £500,000 to the NuLabour party, and whose company PowderJect managed to secure a £32 million Government contract for smallpox vaccine, awarded without it being put out to competitive tender. Allegedly this was because PowderJect had managed to contractually sew up the capacity of the actual pharmceutical company producing the vaccine with an ironclad contract.

Why has this man appeared as a Junior Ministry of Defence Minister ?

Tony McNulty MP for Harrow East is now Minister of State at the Home Office, presumably replacing Des Browne, in charge of Citizenship and Immigration (who in turn had replaced the disgraced Beverely Hughes). Will he really be spearheading the re-introduction of the controversial Identity Cards Bill ?

The BBC reports on the remarkable result in Blaenau Gwent:

"Labour loses safest seat in Wales

Labour suffered a sensational defeat in its safest Welsh seat as Tony Blair secured an historic third term victory.

Independent former Labour AM Peter Law overturned a 19,000 majority in Blaenau Gwent to win by 9,121."

"Blaenau Gwent delivered by far the biggest shock. Mr Law, the local Welsh assembly member who left Labour in protest at the party's use of all-women shortlists to pick its candidate, received 20,505 votes, or 58% of the total"

Peter Law also overcame a recent operation for a brain tumour, to win this seat instead of NuLabour, who were seen to be trying to parachute in a London NuLabour candidate, rather than listening to the local people in Wales - the typical control freak behavior of soviet style appartchiki.

The result is still rather unexpected, and since Peter Law is also still a Member of the Welsh Assembly, NuLabour have technically lost their majority there as well.

David Blunkett is back in the Cabinet as Work and Pensions minister.

Who thinks that the £100 billion social security and pensions budget paid out every year will be safe in his hands ? The Department for Work and Pensions is much bigger than the Home Office, which Blunkett could not manage properly.

Is it really a good idea to have someone with Blunkett's dodgy private life involving bastard children and his pregnant married ex-mistress being dragged through the courts, and incessant media spin, to be in charge of the vulnerable people who depend on the Child Support Agency ?

Will Blunkett's communist authoritarian instincts lead to even more intrusive snooping and means testing, Data Mining and Racial Profiling by the DWP ?

Since the DWP is one of the main targets of Gordon Brown's alleged job cuts and efficiency savings, one can staff expect morale, and therefore standards of service to the public, in this Department, to plummet with the appointment of David "Mastermind" Blunkett who will inevitably be seen to be making tens of thousands of civil servants redundant.

The BBC ticker is reporting: "David Blunkett 'I've got a job'"

He obviously cannot keep his mouth shut, like the other Cabinet Ministers have managed to, ahead of the official announcement.

Please let it be somewhere this disgraceful politician cannot damage our liberties and freedoms any more.

How much did the strong local NO2ID Campaign in Cambridge, who are against the NuLabour ID card and database state plans, contribute to Anne Campbell's defeat ?

Did NO2ID have any influence on the reduction of the majority of one of the most pro-ID Card NuLabour MPs Martin Linton, in Battersea, to only 163 ?

If only NO2ID had the same number of volunteers and the funding of the pro hunting Vote OK organisation.

The Countryside Alliance and other Pro Hunting supporters are claiming to have mounted a more effective campaign than many political parties, through their Vote OK organisation, which, despite not fielding any candidates, apparently sent volunteer canvassers etc. to target constituencies which were held by anti-Hunting politicians, mostly NuLabour but some Liberal Democrat.

Vote OK claim:

• 29 anti-hunting MPs ousted
• 21 anti-hunting MPs left with majorities of less than 3%
• 9 pro-hunting MPs with boosted majorities

  "Massive and unprecedented local campaigning by hunt supporters has contributed to the ousting of 29 anti-hunting former MP's. 3.4 million leaflets were delivered, 2.1 million envelopes hand-addressed 55,000 posters erected and 170,000 campaigning man hours provided in a nationally co-ordinated initiative."
  

It is hard to categorise The Guardian newspaper. On the one hand they are perfectly capable of printing the slimiest NuLabour rubbish, but now and then they do allow an opposing opinion, like this article by Gary Younge which nicely deconstructs some of Peter Hain's spin and the rich NuLabour apologists and supporters who supposedly chatter about politics at their London dinner parties.

We will mirror this article below (with our emphasis), in case it mysteriously disappears from The Guardian's online archives, like Duncan Campbell's "The ricin ring that never was" story.

Has the UK electorate really gone insane ?

The major bookies like William Hill seem to be sure that NuLabour are odds on favourites to win the General Election on Thursday.

Various newspapers such as The Sunday Telegraph and The Scotsman and are speculating on the basis of alleged leaks, about nighmare scenarios such as the imminent return of the disgraced former Home Secretary David Blunkett, who should be facing the criminal charge of misconduct in a public office, rather than the prospect of being back into a position of power in the Cabinet.

Will there be a last minute swing against NuLabour in the marginal constituencies ? Will some of the Tory front bench lose their seats ?
Will an increase in the number of Liberal Democrat MPs actually make any real difference this time ?

If NuLabour do get back in with a workable majority, and the Tory and Liberal Democrat Opposition is as feeble as it was in the last Parliament, then democracy itself will be at risk.

One of NuLabour's most notorious figures, the spin doctor Alastair Campbell seems, according to this report in The Scotsman, to be engaged in political espionage, running a "mole" inside the Tory election campaign headquarters.

Campbell spins Blair into dirty tricks row

BRIAN BRADY
WESTMINSTER EDITOR

LABOUR was propelled into a fresh "dirty tricks" row last night after Alastair Campbell unveiled a new dossier detailing the secrets of the Tory strategy for regaining power.