Tag Archives: George

The news in tweets: Wednesday, July 12, 2023

Who thought we could see this again? It perfectly sums up Boris Johnson’s behaviour towards the Covid Inquiry over his mobile phone and the WhatsApp messages therein.

Boris Johnson refuses to hand over mobile phone containing Covid WhatsApps by inquiry deadline

This is more complicated than it seems. If you were to take Carol Vorderman’s tweet at face value…

… you might think she was saying he hasn’t handed over any of the WhatsApp messages he received and sent at that time. This is not true.

The story is about “Phone 1” – the telephone he used up until April 2021, but (allegedly) switched off amid claims that it could have been hacked by a foreign power.

Johnson himself reckons he is trying to comply with the Covid Inquiry’s demand for the information but is working with government security officials on a way to turn on the old phone without creating a security emergency.

But here’s the thing: the security breach happened long ago – he switched the phone off (he says) because it emerged that his phone number had been public knowledge for 15 years. Apparently this means it could have been hacked.

In that case, it seems to sane people, he should have left it on and handed it to the security people two years ago, so they could work out what possibly compromising information could have been lifted from it by hostile foreign governments (or even teenage hackers living down the road).

He didn’t do that, so…

Yes. When will that happen?

Oh, and it should be possible to retrieve the WhatsApp messages by other means anyway. Why haven’t these “experts” tried that already?

Government response to ‘Kindertransport’ lord on removal of mural at child refugee centre is shockingly insensitive

Lord Alf Dubs, who was himself once a refugee from a foreign country (Germany before World War II – he was a Jewish child who arrived on the Kindertransport) asked the government why it cruelly ordered that a welcoming mural at a child refugee centre in Kent should be over-painted. Here’s the response:

Jessica Simor is right: it is incredibly insensitive of this Tory lord to tell a fellow peer – who was welcomed into the UK as a child – that national policy is now to make the country as unwelcoming as possible.

It seems the government has regressed – de-civilised – during the last 13 years of Tory misrule.

The big Tory wage lie

Read:

Why would the Tories say wages are rising at record rates?

Could it be to justify their demand that they need to be held down in order to slow inflation?

If so, it’s a false argument – as Richard Burgon makes clear:

Here’s some proof about the corporate profits:

Sainsbury’s wouldn’t be paying its chief executive so much if he wasn’t raking in the Long Green.

So it’s definitely the big profits that are pushing up inflation. And what is the Tory government doing about it?

Look:

And here’s a pertinent comment on that choice:

He’s joined in his crackdown on your livelihood by fellow millionaire Andrew Bailey, head honcho at the Bank of England:

Is this the reason Ed Balls tried to dominate the discussion of George Osborne’s wedding on Monday?

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If Rachel Reeves represents Labour’s best thinking, the UK is deep in the you-know-what

Fakes: Rachel Reeves, the fake Labour Chancellor, with her fake Labour leader, Keir Starmer.

I don’t know what image Rachel Reeves hoped to present with her stage-managed interview in The Guardian yesterday (Monday, July 10, 2023) – but the one we got was utterly, utterly awful.

If you’ve got a strong stomach, read the article and you’ll see what I mean about stage-management. She comes across as a total fake.

The really disgraceful stuff is in the segment about Ken Loach. The legendary film director was expelled from Labour in August 2021. It came amid accusations of anti-Semitism but that was never given as the reason for pushing him out.

So in the article we get this from Reeves:

(Loach himself was expelled from Labour in 2021 for appearing on a Labour Against the Witchhunt platform way before that organisation was proscribed by the party. The group was formed to campaign against what were seen as politically motivated allegations of antisemitism in the Labour party). This doesn’t sound like a broad coalition, does it? “Look, Keir’s No 1 thing when he became leader was he was going to tear out antisemitism at the roots, and that means there is a zero-tolerance approach.”

I tell her I am Jewish and that I agree with a zero-tolerance approach to antisemitism, but the party is so gung-ho that it is now labelling people antisemitic who simply aren’t – and there is a danger of destroying lives in the process.

“Well, look, I’m not on the bodies that make those decisions, so I don’t know the details of that case. But it is so important that we are seen to – and we do – tackle antisemitism. Ken Loach, you might like his films, but his views … well, certainly, they are not ones I share.”

That doesn’t make him antisemitic, I say.

“You don’t think Ken Loach is antisemitic? OK. Well, I think we might have to agree to differ.”

Why does she think he is antisemitic? “Look, I’m not on the bodies that make these decisions, but I think it’s right we have a zero-tolerance approach,” she repeats.

You can’t make such an accusation without supporting it, I say.

“Well, look, I’m not on the body who makes these decisions,” she repeats yet again. Loach later tells me there was no due process in his expulsion: he was just told he was unfit to be a party member; antisemitism wasn’t mentioned.

She couldn’t support her claim that Mr Loach was anti-Semitic for one simple reason: he isn’t. And Labour doesn’t have any evidence to the contrary.

But I’ll tell you who was anti-Semitic: Nancy Astor.

Why do I mention this? Because of this:

If you want proof of Reeves’s support for Astor, I can provide it – because I called on Labour’s then-General Secretary to do something about it:

I never heard back from Jennie Formby. It seems that, like the Tories, the Labour leadership follows a One-Rule-For-You, A-Different-Rule-For-Us principle.

We can follow this through to some of the other things Reeves has said lately, like her refusal to commit to paying public sector workers a fair wage:

Public sector workers have seen their pay crumble away under the Tory government. Reeves, as a member of Parliament, has had her own pay shored up with public money, and her pay packet is worth as much in real terms as it was in 2010 when she was first elected.

As I suggested: one rule for us; a different rule for them.

She won’t put any public money into building new houses for people on councils’ waiting lists:

See? She wants to make profit for builders by getting them building private houses. Great for those who can afford it – but those most in need won’t be able to, because she won’t make sure they’re paid the living wage that is required to make that happen. One rule for them…

So she won’t support the “ordinary working people” (as Labour now defines us) – but she’ll happily speak up for a former member of the Tory government that inflicted on us the cruel austerity that has caused so many of these problems.

In so doing, she also took a swipe at protest movements – causing This Writer to note (in another article) that without protesters, she wouldn’t have the right to vote, let alone the chance to have the second-highest job in the land. Here’s Howard Beckett to explain:

That brings us back to the Guardian interview, that took place in Reeves’s home town.

It seems she was desperate to demonstrate that she was still in touch with her family roots.

Sadly, she and her party have long since left their political roots far behind them.

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Putin arrest warrant issued; warrants for Blair and Bush might be more successful

Vladimir Putin: if he ever did go on the run, he might look like this – especially if he didn’t have time to grab a shirt.

Here’s a redundant threat:

The international criminal court (ICC) in The Hague has issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin for overseeing the abduction of Ukrainian children, sending Russia another significant step on the path to becoming a pariah state.

In granting the request for warrants by the ICC prosecutor, a panel of judges agreed that there were “reasonable grounds” to believe Putin and his children’s rights commissioner, Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, bore responsibility for the “unlawful deportation” of Ukrainian children.

The warrants are the first to be issued by the ICC for crimes committed in the Ukraine war, and it is one of the rare occasions when the court has issued a warrant for a sitting head of state

How does the ICC expect to deliver that warrant and have the arrest made?

Vladimir Putin is the head of the Russian state and, despite its losses in Ukraine, that country’s armed forces remain formidable – not to mention its nuclear arsenal.

He has no reason to honour the warrant and there is no possibility of him facing justice for his alleged crimes.

Some think the ICC should concentrate on more achievable aims:

How about it, ICC? Will you go after some alleged war criminals who can be brought to justice? Why not?

Source: ICC judges issue arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin over alleged war crimes | Vladimir Putin | The Guardian

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Here’s why George Eustace is this YouTuber’s ‘Fool of the Week’

Some Tory Brexiteers don’t seem to have the brains they were born with.

Answering a question on whether Brexit is responsible for the UK’s “salad shortage”, former Environment Secretary (I’m not making this up!) George Eustice tried to evade the question by saying the UK is not holding up imports because it isn’t checking incoming freight carrying a number of named goods.

Not only was he negating the very reason we were told Brexit should happen – the UK can’t be “taking back control” if it isn’t actually exercising that control – but he was also telling potential smugglers exactly what they need to say they’re carrying, in order not to be searched at this country’s borders.

Maximilien Robespierre makes the point clearly in this video clip:

The Tories seem to be trying to turn the UK into a smuggler’s paradise. I wonder why.

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Did you know: anyone from anywhere in the world can become a Tory and choose our PM?

It seems anybody, living anywhere in the world, can become a Conservative Party member and choose our new prime minister – if they pay a low membership fee.

This means, as George Monbiot suggests, that a foreign state could set up thousands of memberships in order to meddle with the result.

Is this open invitation for foreign governments to mess with our politics a form of treason?

Consider:

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Is Liz Truss’s government part of a cult set to drag the UK down?

Here’s a terrifying thesis:

George Monbiot reckons Liz Truss and her entire government are members of a neoliberal cult in which money takes control away from democracy, and dark money, neoliberal think tanks run the country through their Tory puppets.

It’s a terrifying prospect – but is it what we’re facing now?

Watch the clip and think:

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Is this really what the Tories call URGENT action to curb river pollution?

Boris Johnson’s Britain: “one of the most effluent nations in the world” as Dr Louise Raw put it when she tweeted this image.

How can the Tory government claim to be taking “urgent” action to curb river pollution when its targets are 13 and 28 years away?

Are we all expected to put up with being hip-deep in human waste in the meantime?

According to Environment Secretary George “Useless” Eustice, he’s taking “urgent” action to cut the “most damaging” overflows into rivers and the sea by 75 per cent – by 2035, with all discharges cut by 80 per cent by 2050.

If that’s “urgent” action, I’d hate to think what “Useless” describes as inconsequential!

Eustice said the government was investing £7 billion until 2025 to upgrade sewage infrastructure but admitted water bills will rise by about £12 a year to cover costs beyond that.

Didn’t the Thatcher Tory government of the 1980s, in its push to privatise water, say that bills would be cheaper and private firms would upgrade infrastructure using their profits? Yes, it did.

So why are we paying for it, in money provided by the government and directly through our own bills?

Some background: last autumn, the Tory government gave polluters the green light to dump risky sewage that has not been properly cleaned into rivers and the sea, after it turned out that Brexit had closed the UK’s borders to chemicals that are used to treat effluent.

The Conservatives followed this up by defeating Lords Amendment 45 to the then Environment Bill, which would have placed a legal duty on water companies in England and Wales “to make improvements to their sewerage systems and demonstrate progressive reductions in the harm caused by discharges of untreated sewage.“

One Conservative, This Writer’s MP Fay Jones, said the amendment would have forced taxpayers to stump up £600 billion to “dig up” and modernise the UK’s sewer system, that has remained unchanged since Victorian times (apparently).

She then blocked responses that requested a breakdown of the figures. Considering her party is now saying £7 billion will cover the work, with an increase in bills to fund further costs, I think it’s fair to say that she overinflated the figures somewhat.

Mind you, she’s not the only one who seems to have – inadvertently? – misled the public. On October 25 last year, The Big Issue published a tweet, and an article, reporting that the water companies were saying they did not know how much sewage they were dumping into England’s rivers because the technology did not exist to monitor it.

But new data released on Thursday showed that in 2021, there were more than 372,000 spill events from from storm overflows, which release untreated sewage and rainwater into the environment to ease pressure on the system.

The Environment Agency said it has made water companies fit monitors to their storm overflows in order to capture information on how they are performing. 2021 was the second year the organisation published figures so it seems the firms were being economical with the facts.

And the facts are that we are being forced to live in our own effluent – along with muck imported from the Netherlands, due to EU restrictions on what can be dumped there – while water companies that are mostly owned by foreign governments coin it in.

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Environment Secretary ‘Useless’ says it’s BIDEN who doesn’t understand Brexit NI protocol

A long record of defending the indefensible: Environment Secretary George Eustice has previously stated beliefs that children should starve during the holidays, asylum seekers should drown and people should die of Covid-19 rather than let the economy be harmed.

What stunning arrogance from a man who has been dubbed “George Useless”.

Environment Secretary George Eustice took to our airwaves to try to minimise the damage done by US President Joe Biden’s words on the Northern Ireland border and trade with the UK after Brexit – and made matters much, much worse.

Biden has expressed concern that peace in Northern Ireland could be jeopardised by the “Northern Ireland protocol” between the UK and the European Union, that regulates imports to and exports from the province.

It keeps Northern Ireland aligned with the EU’s single market for goods to ensure free trade across the Irish border, but has led to additional checks on goods being traded across the Irish Sea between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which has drawn criticism and protests from unionist politicians in Northern Ireland who have called for it to be scrapped.

Boris Johnson swore to everybody who asked – before Brexit happened – that there would be no border checks between GB and NI… and it now seems clear that he was either lying or did not understand his own deal.

The UK has requested a fundamental renegotiation but the EU has refused – and with good reason. Boris Johnson was desperate to rush his Brexit into being, back in 2019, ensuring that many of his MPs did not understand what they were supporting. Any problem now is his responsibility and he will have to live with it – including any problems it creates with the USA.

Eustice turned up on TV and on the radio to suggest that Biden was “wrong” and had, himself, not properly read the details of the agreement that was negotiated, in a series of interviews that will make Boris Johnson’s current meetings with the US president much more difficult:

Eustice’s attitude was that this matter did not concern the US President…

… but that makes no sense at all when the UK is also trying to negotiate a two-way trade deal with the United States (over which Biden is, again, doubtful).

Eustice admitted, “It’s just not a priority for the US administration.”

And Boris Johnson has also said, “The Americans do negotiate very hard.”

It seems nothing has changed since former president Barack Obama said the UK would be at the back of the queue for a bilateral deal.

So of course the Johnson government has a Plan B, which is to join a trade bloc – like the one the UK has just spent five years leaving:

So the situation is this:

If the UK doesn’t get a trade deal with the US because its deal to leave the EU has created problems in Northern Ireland, then Boris Johnson will try to talk the UK into a trading bloc like the EU.

So what was the point of the last five years of fuss and palaver?

In other news, Julia Hartley-Doodah tackled Eustice on the really important issues:

Wow. If only some of our political interviewers could be bothered to dissect the Tories as thoroughly on issues like Universal Credit, rising bills and – yes – Brexit!

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Symbolic: NHS gets the George Cross while its workers get crucified

We’re all on the same page over this one, it seems.

The George Cross is the highest award that can be bestowed by the United Kingdom “for acts of the greatest heroism or for most conspicuous courage in circumstance of extreme danger” by civilians (or military personnel not in the presence of an enemy.

Today, it has been awarded to the National Health Service – not to any individuals within it, but to the organisation itself, in each of the four UK countries.

No NHS worker will receive the medal. None of them will be remotely better-off as a result of this tokenistic act.

Of course the leaders of the NHS in the different countries have made a show of it. Don’t bother watching the video if you don’t want to. I was squirming within 20 seconds…

Here’s a better response: accurate and to the point (it’s also full of strong language so don’t watch if that kind of thing offends you):

Let’s break it down a bit. What good does this symbolic award achieve?

Good points by Paul Bernal – but academic, as no NHS employee has actually received one.

Alastair Campbell gets closer to the aim the Tory government was hoping to achieve, I think:

Exactly. The statement appears to be: “We clapped you, and we gave a medal to your services, that your bosses can display proudly in their headquarters. What more do you want? Money? Sorry. All your getting is a bit of tin and the clap.”

Here’s what NHS staff really need:

The contrast between what’s needed and what’s provided is stark – and insulting.

And we all know it:

Worse still is the injury. NHS workers can’t have their pay rise because, guess where the Tories have put the money instead? Here:

How sad that not one of the NHS bosses has had the courage to tell HM The Queen to take her piece of tin and shove it so far into Boris Johnson that he’ll need surgery to remove it.

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Chauvin guilty of George Floyd murder – and what it means for people in the UK

Derek Chauvin: this image was taken from video footage of him choking George Floyd to death by kneeling on his throat for nine minutes.

A policeman from the United States has been found guilty of all charges related to the murder of African-American George Floyd.

Derek Chauvin, 45, was found guilty on three charges: second-degree murder, third-degree murder and manslaughter.

He will remain in custody until he is sentenced and could spend decades in jail.

The death of Mr Floyd sparked an international wave of protest that resulted in multiple mass “Black Lives Matter” protests here in the United Kingdom and the toppling of statues celebrating slavers – like that of Edward Colston in Bristol.

But here’s the reason the verdict matters directly to people here in the UK:

Derek Chauvin, 45, was filmed kneeling on Mr Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes during his arrest last May.

The widely watched footage sparked worldwide protests against racism and excessive use of force by police.

If members of the public hadn’t taken video of Chauvin choking Mr Floyd to death, it is almost certain that Chauvin would have been able to avoid any charges at all; it would have been the word of a few black people against that of a police officer.

Meanwhile, here in the UK, a police union – the Metropolitan Police Federation – has been campaigning to prevent what it calls “trial by social media”.

These people mean the practice of posting video evidence of police misdeeds on Facebook and (particularly) Twitter.

I wrote about this less than a week ago. At that time, I quoted this tweet –

– and added:

“Two good points, don’t you think? For clarity, they are:

“1. If nobody had taken footage of George Floyd being throttled under the knee of a US police officer, nothing would have been done about it.

“2. It is hypocritical of the MetFed to complain about the sharing of images that shame the police when its own officers have shared images of them behaving inappropriately (to say the least) with the dead bodies of members of the public.

“If the police did not behave inappropriately; if they weren’t prone to violence against the public they are meant to protect; and if we didn’t have reason to believe the system was corruptly supporting them, then nobody would be recording these images – they simply would not happen.

“So, before these people demand what are frankly fascist measures to stop us from holding them to account – and remember, they can still record us (although I understand footage from cop cameras is likely to be restricted due to failings in policing by the officers involved) – it seems clear they should try cleaning up their act instead.

“But I suppose that would take all the fun out of it.”

Well, I reckon they’re going to have all the fun taken out of it now.

Because, after the Chauvin verdict, nobody will have the nerve to suggest banning footage of police brutality from the social media.

Source: George Floyd: Jury finds Derek Chauvin guilty of murder – BBC News

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