Comments on This Site’s stories about the Extinction Rebellion protest in the House of Commons last week have included a few criticising the plan for a citizens’ assembly that the protesters were putting forward.
It seems the organisation has listened, as it has produced a short video explaining its reasoning.
Here it is:
What do you think?
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Around six months ago, This Writer received a form letter from the Department for Work and Pensions, demanding details of my self-employed earnings from me (if I recall correctly) and saying my claim for Carers’ Allowance was in danger if I didn’t respond.
I found this behaviour extremely odd as I had quit Carers’ Allowance more than a year previously.
I wrote back, pointing this out, and also the fact that we had agreed at the time that I had done the right thing and that my finances were in order.
I did not receive a reply – neither acknowledgement nor apology.
I mention this because yesterday, on Twitter, I read the following:
Surprised to receive a letter from HM Government saying that I need to apply for #settlementscheme, being a EEA or Swiss national, while I've been a British Citizen since 1998 and have my Certificate of Naturalisation as well as British passport. Are there more cases like mine?
Apart from the anxiety this is caused individuals—it’s obviously appalling that this has happened—this again shows that Home Office system are not good enough. I really do dread 1 July of this year. There will be, a have no doubt, an avalanche of problems. https://t.co/7FG2hfbOLi
— Prof Tanja Bueltmann (@TanjaBueltmann) May 17, 2021
The Home Office letter, according to the article, tells long-term British citizens they risk losing the right to work, benefits and free healthcare unless they apply for UK immigration status in the next six weeks.
The article states that people are concerned that it reveals weaknesses in the Home Office’s databases, but I don’t think that’s right.
It seems more likely to be an attempt to repeat what I think the DWP was trying to do to me – catch me out by inducing me to provide evidence that could be used against me; a fishing expedition.
And the Home Office has the perfect cover for it at the moment: Brexit.
So officers can say (as they have) that they are using every avenue available to ensure that everyone who needs to apply for the EU settlement scheme may do so, before it is too late and they have to face other consequences.
They say the letter does include a paragraph stating that those who already have citizenship that they do not need to apply – but this is buried on page two, far below the shock announcement that recipients may lose their right to work, benefits and free healthcare (free? It’s supported by our taxes/NI).
It seems clear to me that the Conservatives are abusing their control of the UK’s bureaucracy in order to cause as much fear and confusion as possible, keeping the public off-balance.
This makes people more susceptible to manipulation – and more likely to accept that they deserve punishment when they haven’t done anything wrong.
It’s gaslighting – and right on the border of fraud.
It could be interpreted as a new development of the Tory government’s racist “hostile environment” policy.
I wonder how many people have been fooled by it – and how many other such scams are being run by the Tories?
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Happy hater: Priti Patel’s new law would have deported her own parents. The big question is: would she care?
“Dumpy she-Hitler” Priti Patel has publicly celebrated ending a fundamental freedom for every citizen of the United Kingdom.
Her Immigration Bill has just passed into law, meaning that those of you living in the UK will find it just that little bit harder to leave the country in the future – especially if we’re going to the European Union.
As for immigrating out of the burnt-out wheelie bin Patel and her fellow Tories have made of the country – forget it!
She didn’t mention that in her publicity tweet, though.
No – like the true-blue fake she is, she emphasized the aspect that would appeal to the Brexiters who voted for her cruelty…
After many years of campaigning, I am delighted the Immigration Bill which will end free movement on 31st December has today passed through Parliament.
… little knowing that it affects them as much as it does people from other countries.
Priti Patel, no doubt with that awful smirk on her self righteous face was boasting today about ending our 'Freedom of Movement' Wait until the Brexiters realise they're fucked too.
It’s worth reminding ourselves that Patel’s own parents would not have been allowed into the UK under the laws that she has introduced – that’s the level of hypocrisy she exemplifies:
And a timely reminder, in light of her "delight" at ending free movement, that Patel's own parents arrived in the UK in the 60s for purely economic reasons, ("economic migrants") before Idi Amin decided suddenly to expel Asians from Uganda in 1972https://t.co/dMigfS0jFx
Still, it seems unlikely her parents will be upset by their daughter’s new law – father Sushil Patel ran for election to a council as a representative of UKIP, meaning that – in her family – she’s probably the nice one.
Vilification of this hateful spite queen has been running through Twitter since she made her announcement – but it seems she is protected by a thick shield composed entirely of bigotry, from which the condemnation will rebound like water off a snake’s skin.
We can enjoy it, though:
Priti Patel has tweeted to boast that the immigration Bill is now law and will end freedom of movement on 31 December.
Boasted!
Happy to have reduced the freedoms of British citizens as well as Europeans. Despicable and narrow minded.
Priti Patel, no doubt with that awful smirk on her self righteous face was boasting today about ending our 'Freedom of Movement' Wait until the Brexiters realise they're fucked too.
How ironic that this has come on a day when supporters of Donald Trump have been announcing that they plan to quit the United States and come to the UK.
They’ll get cold comfort here: all they’ll find is Priti Patel waiting to deport them.
They’ll probably end up on Ascension Island or St Helena.
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Dictator Johnson: like all fascists, the only human rights that interest Boris Johnson are his own – which is why he has announced he intends to abolish yours.
They’ve been threatening this for years – since before the EU referendum, in fact – but now Boris Johnson might just be the one who forces it on us:
Boris Johnson & the Tories continue to trash the UK's reputation. Now planning to opt-out of the Human Rights Act & European Convention on Human Rights: the last a perennial right-wing Brexit obsession. ECHR written into Good Friday Agreement but that doesn't stop these vandals. pic.twitter.com/IK8YUN32Bl
Unbelievably, some people are already rejoicing at the thought that the Tories will take away their right not to be tortured (although some disability and sickness benefit claimants would say they have ignored that right for many years now, in any case).
These people are glad that Boris Johnson wants to repeal their right to justice.
And they are glad to relinquish their right to freedom, meaning Johnson could turn them into slaves if he so desired (again, benefit claimants may suggest that the Tories have already imposed slaver on them).
How ironic that the plan is announced on the last night of the Proms, when – partly due to a campaign by Tories like Johnson supporter Jacob Rees-Mogg – sheeple were singing “Britons never, never, never shall be slaves” as though it had any meaning.
Will they be so happy when their right to hold opinions of their own is removed, and they are told they can only agree with what Dictator Johnson tells them?
Let’s be honest, the right to freedom of assembly and association has already gone. Johnson abolished that when he imposed lockdown in March.
I expect he’s looking forward to stripping you of your right to vote…
When they touted this a few years ago, the Tories said they would grant us a “Bill of Rights” instead, by which livestock such as you and I would be allowed such privileges as our rulers saw fit to grant us. Until I see the details (the Torygraph article is behind a paywall) I can’t say they’re even offering us that.
By the way: Yes – this Site has been warning you about this since 2013.
But Vox Political‘s reach is limited. Perhaps if more people read This Site, we would not have been saddled with the increasingly right-wing Tory governments we’ve had since then, culminating in the current disaster being run by Boris Johnson.
But we must not waste time laying blame. We must act to prevent yet another Tory-engineered tragedy for the people of the UK.
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Robert de Niro: internationally, he’s more popular than Donald Trump so he gets to be in the image. Also, he’s not the imbecile who encouraged Americans to ingest bleach.
Hollywood acting legend Robert de Niro took to UK TV screens yesterday with a scathing attack on US president Donald Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
The multi-Oscar winning movie star, who has a longstanding record of political comment, told BBC Newsnight’s Emily Maitlis that the atmosphere around Trump was “almost Shakespearian”:
“It’s like Shakespearean the whole thing” – actor Robert de Niro on how the coronavirus outbreak is being handled in the US#Newsnightpic.twitter.com/k64t3Mhcl9
It would be hard to deny the evidence: last month Trump suggested that people could avoid falling ill with Covid-19 by injecting bleach, and bleach-related poisonings in New York alone doubled overnight.
Trump is seeking re-election this year, and Mr de Niro’s comments that the president cares much less about US citizens than about keeping power could have a major effect on his chances.
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Matt Hancock: as Health Secretary, it seems he has broken data protection laws by handing your information to a commercial organisation that intends to profit from it.
The Times is reporting that the Tory government has handed all your NHS health information to Amazon – free – so that company can make a profit from it.
And they did it without telling you – presumably in the hope that nobody would notice.
How do you feel about that?
When did you give your consent to it?
This is private information which, as a data controller, the NHS should not be passing on to anybody else. That’s the law.
But of course the Tories don’t think that even the laws they write apply to them.
Amazon has been handed the keys to a trove of NHS data it can use to develop products to sell internationally without paying a penny to the UK.
A government contract, revealed under freedom of information laws, shows the partnership goes far beyond the tie-up with Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant announced in July.
The health secretary, Matt Hancock, said at the time the NHS should “embrace” the technology, saying it would cut pressure on GPs and pharmacists. But the contract shows the American tech giant could access more than just NHS website data.
The $863bn company can access “all healthcare information” gathered by the NHS at the UK taxpayers’ expense, including “symptoms, causes and definitions”.
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The lies and political interference surrounding the 2016 EU referendum showed the Conservative government of the day couldn’t run a plebiscite properly.
Now it seems the exclusion of EU citizens based on the UK from voting in the European Parliament elections has proved the current Tory government can’t run an election either.
EU-born voters said they felt they were being “silenced” as this was the only election they had a right to participate in, being ineligible to vote in the referendum or general elections.
And it seems the government has a case to answer, as their names were crossed off the electoral register due to alleged “clerical errors” by local councils. This may amount to multiple breaches of EU treaties, including article 20 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, which states that EU nationals have “the right to vote … under the same conditions as nationals of that state [of residence]”.
It is unlikely that any election result may be voided as a result of these “clerical errors”, it is said that individuals have the right to sue for compensation.
According to The Guardian, “The issue centred on the fact that the UK’s involvement in the elections was confirmed late because of the Brexit crisis and that EU citizens were required to fill in a form called the UC1 or EC6 to declare they would be voting in the UK and not their country of birth.
“There were reports of people being told by officials that they should or could vote in their home country, something the civil rights campaigner Gina Miller said reflected a “hostile environment” creeping into the democratic process.
“But many of the complaints centred on three clerical errors: councils failing to communicate with EU citizens about a second form; councils not sending out the forms to people who requested them on time; and councils failing to register the forms when they were received.”
Is this because councils are not properly funded by the Conservative government?
Complaints that people were being disenfranchised were brought to Mrs May during Prime Minister’s Questions:
Historian and citizens’ rights campaigner Professor Tanya Bueltmann said Theresa May had chosen not to prevent the scandal, despite having been warned several times about the extra forms EU citizens had to submit in order to qualify for a vote – itself in breach of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union:
I see that many people are calling #DeniedMyVote an emerging scandal. It's a lot worse than that: – it's a scandal we knew was coming – it's a scandal @ElectoralCommUK & @theresa_may *chose* not to prevent even though they could have That is the worst thing about it all.
— Prof Tanja Bueltmann (@cliodiaspora) May 23, 2019
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While fabricated claims of racism and anti-Semitism are thrown at the Labour Party in the news every day, it is easy to forget that the Conservative Party – the party that runs the UK’s government – is demonstrably guilty of racism.
The latest revelation is that the victims of Conservative racism who were involved in the Windrush scandal were denied access to services, including some who were refused treatment by the National Health Service.
This is treatment these people will have funded with their taxes.
And Tory Home Secretary Sajid Javid doesn’t even know how many of them have been treated in this despicable way.
WATCH: Home Secretary Sajid Javid admit that the Tories have no idea how many Windrush citizens have been denied NHS treatment. The scandal goes on and on. pic.twitter.com/54FEOOdykH
And instead of forcing the government to account for itself (the above example excepted), our news media demands that we look the other way – to a Labour Party that has far less for which to answer, no matter what Chuka Umunna and Trevor Phillips have been saying (for details, see here).
I have literally spent all of life fighting racism. And today is a sad day @UKLabour is NOT institutionally racist. If it was I would go. @ChukaUmunna & Trevor Phillips interventions are disappointing. Windrush, hostile environment that's a clear example of a racist institution.
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The Home Office says Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) – otherwise known as gagging orders – imposed on members of the Windrush generation who suffered discrimination from the Conservative government are no longer in use.
To This Writer, this indicates that the government has succeeded in silencing everybody it wanted to keep quiet.
Why? What were they likely to say?
Clearly it is utterly unacceptable for the Tories to have threatened to withhold payments to people they have wronged, unless those people agree to remain silent – that is blackmail, a criminal act.
So we may suggest that Mr Javid is a blackmailer.
That’s not a good look for our new Home Secretary!
He needs to go back before the Home Affairs Select Committee and explain himself.
Shame that won’t happen for several weeks, or even months – by which time this matter will be forgotten.
I wonder what Windrush citizen Aldwyn Roberts, who recorded London Is The Place For Me, would say about it?
I doubt he’d be saying “the English people are very much sociable”; still it gives me the opportunity to use the song (he was singing it as he stepped off the Empire Windrush).
Sajid Javid has been accused of trying to “buy the silence” of the Windrush generation by imposing non-disclosure agreements on citizens in return for fast-track compensation payments.
The Guardian revealed last month that several Windrush citizens had been paid some compensation by the Home Office, but then asked to sign an NDA, to the concern of others still waiting for assistance.
Over the weekend the Independent reported others had been put in similar positions in return for speedy payments.
The home secretary told MPs last month that a new compensation scheme for Windrush-era migrants would not involve gagging clauses. “No one will be asked to sign any kind of non-disclosure agreement or anything like that,” he said.
But just days earlier, on 13 July, he had written to the home affairs select committee (HASC) to say that payments had already been made through other routes in some cases and an NDA could have been used.
“I can confirm that Windrush generation cases are sometimes addressed through this route … Whilst there is no requirement, settlement offers are sometimes accompanied by confidentiality clauses, depending on individual circumstances.”
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David Davis really should know when to keep his mouth shut – especially after his own Brexit ‘impact assessments’ debacle and the recent behaviour of his colleague Boris Johnson.
Let us remind ourselves of the disgrace with which Mr Davis has covered himself, courtesy of this video by Peter Stefanovic:
It is clear that Mr Davis lied about the existence of these documents. If anybody wants to split hairs about the difference between an “analysis” and an “assessment”, This Writer would urge them to look up a dictionary definition of both terms and consider whether there really is a huge difference between them.
Now he has said the last-minute agreement on the Irish border, citizens’ rights and the financial settlement between the UK and the EU27 on Brexit is “non-binding”.
According to the BBC: “He stressed that the deal struck by Theresa May on Friday to move to the next phase of talks was a “statement of intent” and not “legally enforceable”.
“Mr Davis has said “full alignment” would apply to the whole of the UK, not just Northern Ireland, but the Sunday Telegraph said Conservative Brexiteers had been reassured that it was “non-binding” and had been included to secure Ireland’s backing for the deal.”
This shows an extraordinary lack of intelligence from Mr Davis.
Only a few weeks ago, his colleague Boris Johnson caused an international incident when he said he believed Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe had been teaching journalism in Iran – confirming the claims of the Iranian authorities who had arrested her (such actions are considered to be ‘soft’ campaigning against the ruling regime there). In fact, she had been on holiday.
Of course the Iranians took Mr Johnson at his word and threatened to double Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s prison term. The imbecilic foreign secretary is in Iran at the time of writing, trying to put right his monumental blunder.
Now Mr Davis has made almost exactly the same kind of blunder – but one that could have far more serious repercussions for everybody in the UK.
What chance the EU 27 will decide that David Davis’ suggestion that the UK’s EU agreement is just ‘a statement of intent’ and so not binding is now good reason for delaying progress on trade talks? High, I’d say
All they would be doing is judging him according to his character: He lied about the ‘impact assessments’ and he reckons Friday’s agreement is a lie as well.
And he is, after all, the UK minister responsible for Brexit.
The harm to Mr Davis’s reputation is indelible. If you want proof – look at the reaction to his claims about trade deals after Brexit.
He told Andrew Marr that the UK could sign a “Canada plus, plus, plus” trade deal with the European Union “the second after we leave”.
What do we think of that? See for yourself:
Half-expect David Davis to announce today there are 57, possibly 58, global trade deals ready for UK to sign on Brexit, already in excruciating detail.
We have a Brexit Secretary who has ruined his own reputation with a silly lie – and giggled like a schoolgirl about it when his falsehood was exposed, let’s remember.
He has acted in extremely bad faith and the EU’s negotiators – not to mention the leaders of the other 27 nations – know it.
And he has ruined not only his own reputation but that of the UK internationally.
Still, he won’t be resigning any time soon. Theresa May is too weak to demand it and besides, the stupid Tory government will simply try to hide behind another lie.
Here it is, in fact:
The PM will address the House of Commons later on Monday and hail a new "sense of optimism" in the Brexit talks and the Cabinet will begin its discussions later this monthhttps://t.co/zTWbGNy2tm
— BBC Daily Politics and Sunday Politics (@daily_politics) December 11, 2017
“New sense of optimism?”
New smell of merde, more like!
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